


































































Class_ Z_2L_ 

Book 5 5 
Gopight N°_ r_ 


COPYRIGHT DEPOSIT. 



2 , 














THE BIG BLUE SOLDIER 


GRACE LIVINGSTON HILL’S 

Charming and Wholesome Romances 


The City of Fire 

The Tryst 

Cloudy Jewel 

Exit Betty 

The Search 

The Red Signal 

The Enchanted Barn 

The Finding of Jasper Holt 

The Obsession of Victoria Gracen 

Miranda 

The Best Man 

Lo, Michael! 

Marcia Schuyler 
Phoebe Deane 
Dawn of the Morning 
The Mystery of Mary 
The Girl from Montana 


[ 


THE 

BIG BLUE 
SOLDIER 

BY 

GRACE LIVINGSTON HILL 

• ;.f • > "•/■ 

AUTHOB OF “THE CITY OF FIRE,” “MARCIA SCHUYLER,” ETC. 


PHILADELPHIA & LONDON 
J. B. LIPPINCOTT COMPANY 

1923 














COPYRIGHT, 1920, 19*1, BY THE GOLDEN RULE COMPANY 
COPYRIGHT, 19*3, BY J. B. LIPPINCOTT COMPANY 


c 


1 


f 


© Cl A6G8519 


PRINTED BY J. B. LIPPINCOTT COMPANY 
AT THE WASHINGTON SQUARE PRESS 
PHILADELPHIA, U. S. A. 

NAft -6 1923 < 



1 



THE BIG BLUE 
SOLDIER 

CHAPTER I 

“And you don’t think maybe I ought 
to have had lemon custard to go with 
the pumpkin instead of the mince?” 

Miss Marilla Chadwick turned from 
her anxious watching at the kitchen 
window to search Mary Amber’s clear 
young eyes for the truth, the whole 
truth, and nothing but the truth. 

“Oh, no, I think mince is much bet¬ 
ter. All men like mince-pie, it’s so— 
sort of comprehensive, you know.” 

Miss Marilla turned back to her win¬ 
dow, satisfied. 

“Well, now, if he came on that train, 
he ought to be in sight around the bend 
of the road in about three minutes,” she 
said tensely. “I’ve timed it often when 


6 


THE BIG BLUE SOLDIER 


folks were coming out from town, and 
it always takes just six minutes to get 
around the bend of the road.” 

All through the months of the Great 
War Miss Marilla had knit and band¬ 
aged and emergencied and canteened 
with an eager, wistful look in her 
dreamy gray eyes, and many a sweater 
had gone to some needy lad with the 
little thrilling remark as she handed it 
over to the committee: 

“I keep thinking, what if my nephew 
Dick should be needing one, and this 
just come along in time?” 

But when the war was over, and most 
people had begun to use pink and blue 
wool on their needles, or else cast them 
aside altogether and tried to forget 
there ever had been such a thing as war, 
and the price of turkeys had gone up so 
high that people forgot to be thankful 
the war was over, Miss Marilla still held 
that wistful look in her eyes, and still 


THE BIG BLUE SOLDIER 


7 


spoke of her nephew Dick with bated 
breath and a sigh. For was not Dick 
among those favored few who were to 
remain and do patrol work for an in¬ 
definite time in the land of the enemy, 
while others were gathered to their wait¬ 
ing homes and eager loved ones? Miss 
Marilla spoke of Dick as of one who 
still lingered on the border-land of ter¬ 
ror, and who laid his young life a con¬ 
tinuous sacrifice for the good of the 
great world. 

A neat paragraph to that effect ap¬ 
peared in The Springhaven Chronicle, a 
local sheet that offered scant news items 
and fat platitudes at an ever-increasing 
rate to a gullible and conceited popu¬ 
lace, who supported it because it was 
really the only way to know what one’s 
neighbors were doing. The paragraph 
was the reluctant work of Mary Amber, 
the young girl who lived next door to 
Miss Marilla and had been her devoted 


8 


THE BIG BLUE SOLDIER 


friend since the age of four, when Miss 
Marilla used to bake sugar cookies for 
her in the form of stogy men with cur¬ 
rant eyes and outstretched arms. 

Mary Amber remembered Nephew 
Dick as a young imp of nine who made 
a whole long, beautiful summer ugly 
with his torments. She also knew that 
the neighbors all round about had mem¬ 
ories of that summer when Dick’s 
parents went on a Western trip and left 
him with his Aunt Marilla. Mary 
Amber shrank from exposing her dear 
friend to the criticisms of such of the 
readers of The Springliaven Chronicle 
as had memories of their cats tortured, 
their chickens chased, their flower-beds 
trampled, their children bullied, and 
their windows broken by the youth¬ 
ful Dick. 

But time had softened the memories 
of that fateful summer in Miss Manila’s 
mind, and, besides, she was sorely in 


THE BIG BLUE SOLDIER' f 9 

need of a hero. Mary Amber had not 
the heart to refuse to write the para¬ 
graph, but she made it as conservative as 
the circumstances allowed. 

But now, at last, among the latest to 
be sent back, Lieutenant Richard 
Chadwick’s division was coming home! 

Miss Marilla read in the paper what 
day they would sail, and that they were 
expected to arrive not later than the 
twenty-ninth; and, as she read, she con¬ 
ceived a wild and daring plan. Why 
should not she have a real, live hero her¬ 
self? A bit belated, of course, but all 
the more distinguished for that. And 
why should not Mary Amber have a 
whole devoted soldier boy of her own for 
the village to see and admire? Not that 
she told Mary Amber that, oh, no! But 
in her mind’s vision she saw herself, 
Mary Amber, and Dick all going to¬ 
gether to church on Sunday morning, 
the bars on his uniform gleaming like 


10 


THE BIG BLUE SOLDIER 


the light in Mary Amber’s hazel eyes. 
Miss Marilla had one sudden pang of 
fear when she thought that perhaps he 
would not wear his uniform home, now 
that everybody else was in citizen’s 
clothing; then her sweet faith in the 
wholesomeness of all things came to her 
rescue, and she smiled in relief. Of 
course he would wear it to come home; 
that would be too outrageous not to, 
when he had been a hero. Of course he 
would wear it the first few days. And 
that was a good reason why she must 
invite him at once to visit her instead of 
waiting until he had been to his home 
and been demobilized. She must have 
him in his uniform. She wanted the 
glory of it for her own brief share in that 
great time of uplifting and sacrifice that 
was so fast going into history. 

So Miss Marilla had hastened into the 
city to consult a friend who worked in 
the Red Cross and went out often to the 


THE BIG BLUE SOLDIER 


11 


wharves to meet the incoming boats. 
This friend promised to find out just 
when Dick’s division was to land, to 
hunt him up herself, and to see that he 
had the invitation at once. “See that he 
came ” she put it, with a wise reserva¬ 
tion in her heart that the dear, loving 
soul should not be disappointed. 

And now, the very night before, this 
friend had called Miss Marilla on the 
telephone to say that she had informa¬ 
tion that Dick’s ship would dock at eight 
in the morning. It would probably be 
afternoon before he could get out to 
Springhaven; so she had better arrange 
to have dinner about half past five. So 
Miss Marilla, with shining eyes and 
heart that throbbed like a young girl’s, 
had thrown her cape over her shoulders 
and hastened in the twilight through the 
hedge to tell Mary Amber. 

Mary Amber, trying to conceal her 
inward doubts, had congratulated Miss 


12 THE BIG BLUE SOLDIER 

Marilla and promised to come over the 
first thing in the morning to help get 
dinner. Promised also, after much 
urging, almost with tears on the part of 
Miss Marilla, to stay and help eat the 
dinner afterward in company with Miss 
Marilla and the young lieutenant. 
From this part of her promise Mary 
Amber’s soul recoiled, for she had no 
belief that the young leopard with whom 
she had played at the age of ten could 
have changed his spots in the course of 
a few years, or even covered them with 
a silver bar. But Mary Amber soon 
saw that her presence at that dinner was 
an intrinsic part of Miss Manila’s joy 
in the anticipation of the dinner; and, 
much as she disliked the position of 
being flung at the young lieutenant in 
this way, she promised. After all, what 
did it matter what he thought of her 
anyway, since she had no use for him? 
And then, she could always quietly 


THE BIG BLUE SOLDIER 13 

freeze him whenever Miss Manila’s 
back was turned. And Mary Amber 
could freeze with her hazel eyes when 
she tried. 

So quite early in the morning Miss 
Marilla and Mary Amber began a 
cheerful stir in Miss Manilla’s big sunny 
kitchen, and steadily, appetizingly, 
there grew an array of salads and pies 
and cakes and puddings and cookies and 
doughnuts and biscuits and pickles and 
olives and jellies; while a great bird 
stuffed to bursting went through the 
seven stages of its final career to 
the oven. 

But now it was five o’clock. The 
bird with brown and shining breast was 
waiting in the oven, “done to a turn;” 
mashed potatoes, sweet potatoes, squash, 
succotash, and onions had received the 
finishing-touches, and had only to be 
“taken up.” Cranberries and pickles 
and celery and jelly gave the final 


14 


THE BIG BLUE SOLDIER 


touches to a perfect table, and the side¬ 
board fairly groaned under its load of 
pies and cake. One might have thought 
a whole regiment were to dine with 
Miss Marilla Chadwick that day, from 
the sights and smells that filled the 
house. Up in the spare room the fire 
glowed in a Franklin heater, and a ge¬ 
ranium glowed in a west window be¬ 
tween spotless curtains to welcome the 
guest; and now there was nothing left 
for the two women to do but the final 
anxiety. 

Mary Amber had her part in that, 
perhaps even more than her hostess and 
friend; for Mary Amber was jealous 
for Miss Marilla, and Mary Amber 
was youthfully incredulous. She had 
no trust in Dick Chadwick, even 
though he was an officer and had patrol¬ 
led an enemy country for a few months 
after the war was over. 

Mary Amber had slipped over to her 


THE BIG BLUE SOLDIER 15 

own house when she finished mashing 
the potatoes, and changed her gown. 
She was putting little squares of but¬ 
ter on the bread-and-butter plates now, 
and the setting sun cast a halo of bur¬ 
nished light over her gold hair, and 
brightened up the silk of her brown 
gown with its touches of wood-red. 
Mary Amber was beautiful to look 
upon as she stood with her butterknife 
deftly cutting the squares and drop¬ 
ping them in just the right spot on the 
plates. But there was a troubled look 
in her eyes as she glanced from time 
to time at the older woman over by the 
window. Miss Marilla had given over 
all thought of work, and was intent 
only on the road toward the station. It 
would seem as if not until this moment 
had her great faith failed her, and the 
thought come to her that perhaps he 
might not come. 

“You know, of course, he might not 


16 THE BIG BLUE SOLDIER 

get that train/’ she said meditatively. 
“The other leaves only half an hour 
later. But she said she’d tell him to 
take this one.” 

“That’s true, too,” said Mary Amber 
cheerily. “And nothing will be hurt by 
waiting. I’ve fixed those mashed pota¬ 
toes so they won’t get soggy by being 
too hot, and I’m sure they’ll keep hot 
enough.” 

“You’re a good, dear girl, Mary Am¬ 
ber,” said Miss Marilla, giving her a 
sudden impulsive kiss. “I only wish I 
could do something great and beauti¬ 
ful for you.” 

Miss Marilla caught up her cape, and 
hurried toward the door. 

“I’m going out to the gate to meet 
him,” she said with a smile. “It’s time 
he was coming in a minute now, and I 
want to be out there without hurrying.” 

She clambered down the steps, her 
knees trembling with excitement. She 


i 


17 


THE BIG BLUE SOLDIER 

hoped Mary Amber had not looked out 
of the window. A. boy was coming 
on a bicycle; and, if he should be a boy 
* with a telegram or a special-delivery 
letter, she wanted to read it before 
Mary Amiber saw her. Oh, how awful 
if anything had happened that he 
couldn’t come to-day! Of course, he 
might come later to-night, or to-mor¬ 
row; and a turkey would keep, though 
it was never so good as the minute it 
was taken out of the oven. 

The boy was almost to the gate now, 
and—yes, he was going to stop. He 
was swinging one leg out with that 
long movement that meant slowing up. 
She panted forward with a furtive 
glance back at the house. She hoped 
Mary Amber was looking at the turkey 
and not out of the window. 

It seemed that her fingers had sud¬ 
denly gone tired while she was writing 
her name in that boy’s book, and they 


2 


18 the big blue soldier 

almost refused to tear open the en¬ 
velope as the boy swung on his wheel 
again and vanished down the road. She 
had presence of mind enough to keep 
her back to the house and the telegram 
in front of her as she opened it covertly, 
trying to keep the attitude of still look¬ 
ing eagerly down the road, while the 
typewritten brief message got itself 
across to her tumultuous mind. 

“ Impossible to accept invitation. Have other 
engagements. Thanks just the same. 

“(Signed) 

Lieutenant Richard H. Chadwick." 

Miss Marilla tore the yellow paper 
hastily, and crumpled it into a ball in 
her hands as she stared down the road 
through brimming tears. She man¬ 
aged an upright position; but her 
knees were shaking under her, and a 
gone feeling came* in her stomach. 
Across the sunset sides in letters of ac¬ 
cusing size there seemed to blaze the 
paragraphs from The Springhaven 


19 


THE BIG BLUE SOLDIER 

Chroniclej, copied afterwards in the 
county Gazette , about Miss Ma- 
riila Chadwick’s nephew. Lieutenant 
Richard LL Chadwick, who was ex¬ 
pected at his aunt’s home as soon as he 
landed in this country after a long 
and glorious career in other lands, and 
who would spend the week-end with 
his aunt, and “doubtless be heard from 
at the Springhaven Club House before 
he left.” Her throat caught with a 
queer little sound like a groan. Still, 
with her hand grasping the front gate 
convulsively, Miss Marilla stood and 
stared down the road, trying to think 
what to do, how to word a paragraph 
explaining why he did not come, how 
to explain to Mary Amber so that that 
look of sweet incredulousness should 
not come into her eyes. 

Then suddenly, as she stared 
through her blur of tears, there ap¬ 
peared a straggling figure, coming 


20 THE BIG BLUE SOLDIER 

around the bend of the road by the 
Hazard house; and Miss Marilla, with 
nothing at all in her mind but to escape 
from the watchful, loving eyes of Mary 
Amber for a moment longer, till she 
could think what to say to her, 
staggered out the gate and down the 
road toward the person, whoever it was, 
that was coming slowly up the road. 

On stumbled Miss Marilla, nearer 
and nearer to the oncoming man, till 
suddenly through a blur of tears she 
noticed that he wore a uniform. Her 
heart gave a leap, and for a moment she 
thought it must be Dick; that he had 
been playing her a joke by the tele¬ 
gram, and was coming on immediately 
to surprise her before she had a chance 
to be disappointed. It was wonderful 
how the years had done their halo work 
for Dick with Miss Marilla. 

She stopped short, trembling, one 
hand to her throat. Then, as the man 


21 


THE BIG BLUE SOLDIER 

drew nearer and she saw his halting 
gait, saw, too, his downcast eyes and 
whole dejected attitude, she somehow 
knew it was not Dick. Never would he 
have walked to her home in that way. 
There had been a swagger about little 
Dick that could not be forgotten. The 
older Dick, crowned now with many 
honors, would not have forgotten to 
hold his head high. 

Unconscious of her attitude of in¬ 
tense interest she stood with hand still 
fluttering at her throat, and eyes 
brightly on the man as he advanced. 

When he was almost opposite to her, 
he looked up. He had fine eyes and 
good features; but his expression was 
bitter for one so young, and in the eyes 
there was a look of pain. 

“Oh! excuse me,” said Miss Marilla, 
looking around furtively to be sure 
Mary Amber could not see them so far 
away. “Are you in a very great hurry?” 


22 


THE BIG BLUE SOLDIER 


The young man looked surprised, 
amused, and slightly bored, but paused 
politely. 

“Not specially,” he said; and there 
was a tone of dry sarcasm in his voice. 
“Is there anything I can do for you?” 

ITe lifted the limp little trench-cap, 
and paused to rest his lame knee. 

“Why, I was wondering if you 
would mind coming in and eating din¬ 
ner with me,” spoke Miss Manila 
eagerly from a dry throat of embarrass¬ 
ment. “You see my nephew’s a re¬ 
turned soldier, and I’ve just got word 
he can’t come. The dinner’s all ready 
to be dished up, and it needn’t take you 
long.” 

“Dinner sounds good to me,” said 
the young man with a grim glimmer of 
a smile. “I guess I can accommodate 
you, madam. I haven’t had anything 
to eat since I left the camp last night.” 


THE BIG BLUE SOLDIER 23 

“Oh! You poor child!” said Miss Ma¬ 
nila, beaming on him with a welcom¬ 
ing smile. “Now isn’t it fortunate I 
should have asked you?” as if there had 
been a throng of passing soldiers from 
which she might have chosen. “But 
are you sure I’m not keeping you from 
some one else who is waiting for you?” 

“If there’s any one else waiting any¬ 
where along this road for me, it’s all 
news to me, madam; and anyhow you 
got here first, and I guess you have first 
rights.” 

He had swung into the easy, familiar 
vernacular of the soldier now; and for 
the moment his bitterness was held in 
abeyance, and the really nice look in his 
eyes shone forth. 

“Well, then, we’ll just go along in,” 
said Miss Marilla, casting another 
quick glance toward the house. “And 
I think I’m most fortunate to have 
found you. It’s so disappointing to 


24 


THE BIG BLUE SOLDIER 


get dinner ready for company and then 
not have any.” 

“Must be almost as disappointing as 
to get all ready for dinner and then not 
have any,” said the soldier affably. 

Miss Marilla smiled wistfully. 

“I suppose your name doesn’t hap¬ 
pen to be Richard, does it?” she asked 
with that childish appeal in her eyes 
that had always kept her a young 
woman and good company for Mary 
Amber, even though her hair had long 
been gray. 

“Might just as well be that as any¬ 
thing else,” he responded, affably, will¬ 
ing to drop into whatever role was set 
for him in this most unexpected byplay. 

“And you wouldn’t mind if I should 
call you Dick?” she asked with a wistful 
look in her blue eyes. 

“Like nothing better,” he assented 
glibly, and found his own heart warm¬ 
ing to this confiding stranger lady. 


THE BIG BLUE SOLDIER 


25 


“That’s beautiful of you!” She put 
out a shy hand, and laid it lightly on the 
edge of his cuff. “You don’t know how 
much obliged I am. You see, Mary 
Amber hasn’t ever quite believed he was 
coming — Dick, I mean — and she’s 
been so kind, and helped me get the 
dinner and all. I just couldn’t bear to 
tell her he wasn’t coming.” 

The young soldier stopped short in 
the middle of the road, and whistled. 

“Horrors!” he exclaimed in dismay 
“Are there other guests? Who is Mary 
Amber?” 

“Why, she’s just my neighbor, who 
played with you—I mean with Dick 
when he was here visiting as a child a 
good many years ago. I’m afraid he 
wasn’t always as polite to her then as a 
boy ought to be to a little girl; and— 
well, she’s never liked him very well. I 
was afraid she would say, T told you 
so’ if she thought he didn’t come. It 


26 


THE BIG BLUE SOLDIER 


won’t be necessary for me to tell any 
lies, you know. I’ll just say, ‘Dick, 
this is Mary Amber; I suppose you 
don’t remember her,’ and that’ll be all. 
You don’t mind, do you? It won’t take 
long to eat dinner.” 

“But I’m a terrible mess to meet a 
girl!” he exclaimed uneasily, looking 
down deprecatingly at himself. “I 
thought it was just you. This uni¬ 
form’s three sizes too large, and needs 
a drink. Besides,” he passed a specu¬ 
lative hand over his smoothly shaven 
chin, “I—don’t care for girls!” There 
was a deep frown between his eyes, and 
the bitter look had come back on his 
face. Miss Maxilla thought he looked 
as if he might be going to run away. 

“Oh, that’s all right!” said Miss Ma¬ 
nila anxiously. “Neither does Mary 
Amber like men. She says they’re all a 
selfish conceited lot. You needn’t have 
much to do with her. Just eat your 


THE BIG BLUE SOLDIER 


27 


dinner and tell anything you want to 
about the war. We won’t bother you to 
talk much. Come; this is the house, and 
the turkey must be on the table getting 
cold by now.” 

She swung open the gate, and laid a 
persuasive hand on the shabby sleeve; 
and the young man reluctantly fol¬ 
lowed her up the path to the front door. 


CHAPTER II 


When Lyman Gage set sail for 
France three years before, he left be¬ 
hind him a modest interest in a promis¬ 
ing business enterprise, a girl who 
seemed to love him dearly, and a debt 
of several thousand dollars to her 
father, who had advised him to go into 
the enterprise and furnished the funds 
for his share in the capital. 

When he had returned from France 
three days before, he had been met with 
news that the business enterprise had 
gone to smash during the war, the girl 
had become engaged to a dashing 
young captain with a well-feathered 
nest, and the debt had become a gall¬ 
ing yoke. 

“Father says, tell you you need not 
worry about the money you owe him,” 
wrote the girl sweetly, concluding her 

96 


THE BIG BLUE SOLDIER 29 

revelations. “You can pay it at your 
leisure when you get started again/* 
Lyman Gage lost no time in gather¬ 
ing together every cent he could scrape 
up. This was more than he had at first 
hoped, because of the fact that he 
owned two houses in the big city in 
which he had landed; and these houses, 
though old and small, happened to be 
located in the vicinity of a great indus¬ 
trial plant that had sprung up since the 
end of the war, and houses were going 
at soaring prices. They were snapped 
up at once at a sum that was fabulous 
in comparison with their real value. 
This, with what he had brought home 
and the bonus he received on landing, 
exactly covered his indebtedness to the 
man who was to have been his father-in- 
law; and, when he turned away from 
the window where he had been tele¬ 
graphing the money to his lawyer in a 
far State with instructions to pay the 


30 


THE BIG BLUE SOLDIER 


loan at once, he had just forty-six cents 
left in his pocket. 

Suddenly, as he reflected that he had 
done the last thing there was left that 
he now cared to do on earth, the noises 
of the great city got hold upon his 
nerve, and tore and racked it. 

He was filled with a great desire to 
get out and away from it, he cared not 
where, only so that the piercing sounds 
and rumbling grind of the traffic of the 
city should not press upon the raw 
nerves and torture them. 

With no thought of getting anything 
to eat or providing for a shelterless 
night that was fast coming on, he wan¬ 
dered out into the train-area of the 
great station, and idly read the names 
up over the train-gates. One caught 
his fancy, ^Purling Brook." It 
seemed as if it might be quiet there, 
and a fellow could think. He followed 
the impulse, and strode through the 


THE BIG BLUE SOLDIER 


31 


gates just as they were about to be 
closed. Dropping into the last seat in 
the car as the train was about to start, 
he flung his head back, and closed his 
eyes wearily. He did not care whether 
he ever got anywhere or not. He was 
weary in heart and spirit. He wished 
that he might just sink away into noth¬ 
ingness. He was too tired to think, to 
bemoan his fate, to touch with torturing 
finger of memory all the little beauti¬ 
ful hopes that he had woven about the 
girl he thought he loved better than any 
one else on earth. Just passingly he 
had a wish that he had a living mother 
to whom he could go with his sick heart 
for healing. But she had been gone 
long years, and his father even longer. 
There was really no one to whom he 
cared to show his face, now that all 
he had counted dear on earth had been 
suddenly taken from him. 

The conductor roused him from a 


32 


THE BIG BLUE SOLDIER 


profound sleep, demanding a ticket, 
and he had the good fortune to remem¬ 
ber the name he had seen over the gate: 
“Purling Brook. How much?” 

“Fifty-six cents.” 

Gage reached into his pocket, and 
displayed the coins on his palm with 
a wry smile. 

“Guess you better put me off here, 
and I’ll walk,” he said, stumbling 
wearily to his feet. 

“That’s all right, son. Sit down,” 
said the conductor half roughly. “You 
pay me when you come back sometime. 
I’ll make it good.” And he glanced at 
the uniform kindly. 

Gage looked down at his shabby self 
helplessly. Yes, he was still a soldier, 
and people had not got over the habit 
of being kind to the uniform. He 
thanked the conductor, and sank into 
sleep again, to be roused by the same 
kindly hand a few minutes later at Pur- 


THE BIG BLUE SOLDIER 


33 


ling Brook. He stumbled off, and 
stood looking dazedly about him at the 
trig little village. The sleep was not 
yet gone from his eyes, nor the ache 
from his nerves; but the clear quiet 
of the little town seemed to wrap 
him about soothingly like salve, and 
the crisp air entered into his lungs, and 
gave him heart. He realized that he 
was hungry. 

It seemed to have been a popular 
afternoon train that he had travelled 
upon. He looked beyond the groups 
of happy home-comers to where it hur¬ 
ried away gustily down the track, even 
then preparing to stop at the next near 
suburban station to deposit a few more 
home-comers. There on that train 
went the only friend he felt he had in 
the world at present, that grizzly con¬ 
ductor with his kindly eyes looking 
through great bifocals like a pleasant 

old grasshopper. 

s 


34 


THE BIG BLUE SOLDIER 


Well, he could not remain here any 
longer. The air was biting, and the sun 
was going down. Across the road the 
little drug-store even then was twink¬ 
ling out with lights behind its blue and 
green glass urns. Two boys and a girl 
were drinking something at the soda- 
fountain through straws, and laughing 
a great deal. It somehow turned him 
sick, he could not tell why. He had 
done things like that many a time 
himself. 

There was a little stone church down 
the street, with a spire and bells. The 
sun touched the bells with burnished 
crimson till they looked like Christmas 
cards. A youthful rural football team 
went noisily across the road, discours¬ 
ing about how they would come out that 
night if their mothers would let them; 
and the station cab came down the 
street full of passengers, and waited for 
a lady at the meat-market. He could 


THE BIG BLUE SOLDIER 35 

see the legs of a chicken sticking out 
of the basket as the driver helped her in. 

He began to wonder why he hadn’t 
stayed in the city and spent his forty- 
six cents for something to eat. It 
would have bought a great many 
crackers, say, or even bananas. He 
passed the bakery, and a whiff of fresh- 
baked bread greeted his nostrils. He 
cast a wistful eye at the window. Of 
course he might go in and ask for a 
job in payment for his supper. There 
were his soldier’s clothes. But no. 
That was equivalent to begging. He 
could not quite do that. Here in town 
they would have all the help they 
wanted. Perhaps, farther out in the 
country—perhaps—he didn’t know 
what; only he couldn’t bring himself to 
ask for food, even with the offer to 
work. He didn’t care enough for that. 
What was hunger, anyway? A thing 
to be satisfied and come again. What 


36 


THE BIG BLUE SOLDIER 


would happen if he didn’t satisfy it? 
Die, of course, but what did it matter? 
What was there to live for, anyway? 

He passed a house all windows, 
where children were gathered about a 
piano with one clumsily playing an ac¬ 
companiment. There was an open fire, 
and the long windows came down to the 
piazza floor. They were singing at the 
top of their lungs, the old, time-worn 
song made familiar to them by com¬ 
munity sing-songs, still good to them 
because they all knew it so well, 

“ There’s a long, long trail a-winding 
Until my dreams all come true;” 

and it gripped his heart like a knife. He 
had sung that song with her when it was 
new and tender, just before he sailed 
away; and the trail had seemed so long! 
And now he had reached the end of it, 
and she had not been there to meet him! 
It was incredible! She so fair! And 
false! After all those months of wait- 


THE BIG BLUE SOLDIER 


37 


ing! That was the hardest part of it, 
that she could have done it, and then ex¬ 
plained so lightly that he had been 
away so long she was sure he would 
understand, and they both must have 
got over their childish attachment; and 
so on, through the long, nauseating 
sentences of her repeal. He shuddered 
as he said them over to his tired heart, 
and then shuddered again with the keen 
air; for his uniform was thin, and he 
had no overcoat. 

What was that she had said about 
the money? He needn’t worry about 
it. A sort of bone to toss to the lone 
dog after he was kicked out. Ah, well! 
It was paid. He was glad of that. He 
was even grimly glad for his own desti¬ 
tution. It gave a kind of sense of satis¬ 
faction to have gone hungry and home¬ 
less to pay it all in one grand lump, and 
to have paid it at once, and through his 
lawyer, without any word to her or her 


38 


THE BIG BLUE SOLDIER 


father either. They should not be even 
distant witnesses of his humiliation. 
He would never cross their path again 
if he had his way. They should be as 
completely wiped out of his existence 
and he out of theirs as if the same uni¬ 
verse did not hold them. 

He passed down the broad, pleasant 
street in the crisp air, and every home 
on either hand gave him a thrust of 
memory that stabbed him to the heart. 
It was such a home as one of these that 
he had hoped to have some day, al¬ 
though it would have been in the city, 
perhaps, for she always liked the city. 
He had hoped in the depths of his heart 
to persuade her to the country, though. 
Now he saw as in a revelation how futile 
such hopes had been. She would never 
have come to love sweet, quiet ways 
such as he loved. She couldn’t ever 
have really loved him, or she would have 
waited, would not have changed. 


THE BIG BLUE SOLDIER 39 

Over and over again he turned the 
bitter story, trying to get it settled in 
his heart so that the sharp edges would 
not hurt so, trying to accustom himself 
to the thought that she whom he had 
cherished through the blackness of the 
years that were past was not what he 
had thought her. He stopped in the 
road beside a tall hedge that hid the 
Hazard house from view, and snatched 
out her picture that he had carried in 
his breast pocket till now; snatched it 
out, gazed upon it with a look that was 
not good to see on a young face, and 
tore it across! He took a step forward, 
and every step he tore a tiny fragment 
from the picture and flung it into the 
road bit by bit till the lovely face was 
mutilated in the dust where the feet of 
passers-by would grind upon it and 
where those great blue eyes that had 
gazed back at him from the picture so 
long would be destroyed forever. It 


40 THE BIG BLUE SOLDIER 

was the last thread that bound him to 
her, that picture; and, when the last 
scrap of picture had fluttered away 
from him, he put his head down and 
strode forward like one who has cast 
away from him his last hope. 

The voice of Miss Marilla roused him 
like a homely, pleasant sound about the 
house of a morning when one has had 
an unhappy dream; and he lifted his 
head, and, soldier-like, dropped into the 
old habit of hiding his emotions. 

Her kindly face somehow comforted 
him, and the thought of dinner was a 
welcome one. The ugly tragedy of his 
life seemed to melt awav for the mo- 
ment, as if it could not stand the light 
of the setting sun and her wholesome 
presence. There was an appeal in her 
eyes that reached him; and somehow he 
didn’t feel like turning down her naive, 
childlike proposition. Besides, he was 
used to being cared for because he was 


THE BIG BLUE SOLDIER 41 

a soldier, and why not once more now 
when everything else had gone so rot¬ 
ten? It was an adventure, anyway, 
and what was there left for him but ad¬ 
venture? he asked himself with a little 
bitter sneer. 

But, when she mentioned a girl , that 
was a different thing! Girls were all 
treacherous. It was a new conviction 
with him; but it had gone deep, so deep 
that it had extended not only to a cer¬ 
tain girl or class of girls, but to all girls 
everywhere. He had become a woman- 
hater. He wanted nothing more to do 
with any of them. And yet at that 
moment his tired, disappointed, hurt 
man’s soul was really crying out for 
the woman of the universe to comfort 
him, to explain to him this awful cir¬ 
cumstance that had come to all his 
bright dreams. A mother, that was 
what he thought he wanted; and Miss 
Marilla looked as if she might make 


42 THE BIG BLUE SOLDIER 

a nice mother. So he turned like a tired 
little hungry boy, and followed her, at 
least until she said “girl.” Then he 
almost turned and fled. 

Yet, while Miss Manila coaxed and 
explained about Mary Amber, he stood 
facing again the lovely vision of the girl 
he had left behind at the beginning of 
the long, long trail, and whose picture 
he had just trampled underfoot on this 
end of the trail, which it now seemed to 
him would wind on forever alone for 
him. As he paused on Miss Manila’s 
immaculate front steps, he was prepar¬ 
ing himself to face the enemy of his life 
in the form of woman. The one thing 
really that made him go into that house 
and meekly submit to be Miss Manila’s 
guest was that his soul had risen to bat¬ 
tle. He would fight Girl in the con¬ 
crete! She should be his enemy from 
henceforth. And this strange, un¬ 
known girl, who hated men and thought 


43 


THE BIG BLUE SOLDIER 

them conceited and selfish, this cold, in¬ 
human creature, was likely false¬ 
hearted too, like the one he had loved 
and who had not loved him. He would 
show her what he thought of such girls, 
of all girls; what all men who knew any¬ 
thing about it thought of all girls! And, 
thus reasoning, he followed Miss Ma¬ 
nila into the pleasant oilcloth-covered 
hall, and up the front stairs to the spare 
room, where she smilingly showed him 
the towels and brushes prepared for his 
comfort, and left him, calling cheerily 
back that dinner would be on the table 
as soon as he was ready to come down. 

All the time he was bathing his tired, 
dirty face and cold, rough hands in the 
warm, sweet-scented soap-suds, and 
wiping them on the fragrant towel, 
even while he stood in front of the mir¬ 
ror all polished to reflect the visage of 
Lieutenant Richard H. Chadwick, and 
brushed his close-cropped curls till 


44 THE BIG BLUE SOLDIER 

there was not a hint of wave left in 
them, he was hardening himself to meet 
Girl in the concrete and get back a re¬ 
turn for what she had done to his life. 

Then, with a last final polish of the 
brush and a flick of the whisk-broom 
over his discouraged-looking uniform, 
he set his lips grimly, and went down¬ 
stairs, taking the precaution to fold his 
cap and put it into his pocket, for he 
might want to escape at any minute, 
and it was best to be prepared. 


CHAPTER III 


Mary Amber was bearing in the 
great platter of golden-brown turkey 
when he first saw her, and had not heard 
him come down. She was entirely off 
her guard, with a sweet, serious intent¬ 
ness upon her work and a stray wisp 
of gold hair set afloat across the 
kitchen-flushed cheek. She looked so 
sweet and serviceable and true, with 
her lips parted in the pleasure of the 
final completion of her task, that the 
soldier was taken by surprise and 
thrown entirely off his guard. Was this 
the false-hearted creature he had come 
to fight? 

Then Mary Amber felt his eyes upon 
her as he stood staring from the open 
hall door, and, lifting her own clear 
ones, froze into the opponent at once. 
A very polite opponent, it is true, with 

>5 


46 


THE BIG BLUE SOLDIER 


all the grace of a young queen, but 
nevertheless an opponent, cold as a 
young icicle. 

Miss Marilla with bright eyes and 
preternaturally pink cheeks spoke into 
the vast pause that suddenly sur¬ 
rounded them all, and her voice sounded 
strangely unnatural to herself. 

“Dick, this is Mary Amber; I sup¬ 
pose you don’t remember her.” 

And the young soldier, not yet quite 
recovered from that first sweet vision of 
Mary Amber, went forward with his 
belligerence to woman somewhat held 
in abeyance. 

“You—have changed a good deal 
since then, haven’t you?” he managed 
to ask with his native quickness to say 
the right tiling in an emergency. 

“A good many years have passed,” 
she said, coolly putting out a reluctant 
hand to please Miss Marilla. “You 


THE BIG BLUE SOLDIER 


47 


don’t look at all as you did. I never 
should have known you.” 

The girl was looking keenly at him, 
studying his face closely. If a soldier 
just home from an ocean trip could get 
any redder, his face would have grown 
so under her scrutiny. Also, now he 
was face to face with her, he felt his 
objection to Girl in general receding 
before the fact of his own position. 
How had that ridiculous old woman ex¬ 
pected him to carry off a situation like 
this without giving it away? How was 
he supposed to converse with a girl he 
had never seen before, about things he 
had never done,—with a girl with whom 
he was supposed to have played in his 
youth? Why had he been such a fool 
as to get into this corner just for the 
sake of one more dinner? Why, to¬ 
morrow he would need another dinner, 
and all the to-morrows through which 
he might have to live. What was one 


48 


THE BIG BLUE SOLDIER 


dinner more or less? He felt in his hip 
pocket for the comforting assurance of 
his cap, and gave a furtive glance to¬ 
ward the hall door. It wouldn’t be far 
to bolt back to the road, and what would 
be the difference? He would never see 
either of the two again. 

Then the sweet, anxious eyes of his 
hostess met his with an appealing smile 
and he felt himself powerless to move. 

The girl’s eyes had swept over his ill- 
fitting uniform and he seemed to feel 
every crease and stain. 

“I thought they told us you were an 
officer, but I don’t see your bars.” She 
laughed mockingly, and searched his 
face again accusingly. 

“This is another fellow’s uniform,” 
he answered lamely. “Mine got shrunk 
so I could hardly get into it, and an¬ 
other fellow who was going home 
changed with me.” 

He lifted his eyes frankly, for it was 


THE BIG BLUE SOLDIER 49 

the truth that he told, and he looked 
into her eyes, but saw that she did not 
believe him. Her dislike and distrust 
of the little boy Dick had come to the 
front. He saw that she believed that 
Dick had been boasting to his aunt of 
honors that were not his. A wave of 
anger swept over his face; yet somehow 
he could not summon his defiance. 
Somehow he wanted her to believe him. 

They sat down at the beautiful table, 
and the turkey got in its work on his 
poor human sensibilities. The delicate 
perfume of the hot meat as it fell in 
large, flaky slices from Miss Manila’s 
sharp knife, the whiff of the summer 
savory and sage and sweet marjoram in 
the stuffing, the smoothness of the 
mashed potatoes, the brownness of the 
candied sweet potatoes, all cried out to 
him and held him prisoner. The odor of 
the food brought a giddiness to his 
head, and the faintness of hunger at- 

4 


50 


THE BIG BLUE SOLDIER 


tacked him. A pallor grew under the 
tan of his face, and there were dark 
shadows under his nice eyes that quite 
touched Miss Marilla, and almost soft¬ 
ened the hard look of distrust that had 
been growing around Mary Amber’s 
gentle lips. 

“This certainly is great!” he mur¬ 
mured. “I don’t deserve to get in on 
anything like this, but I’m no end 
grateful.” 

Mary Amber’s questioning eyes re¬ 
called him in confusion to his role of 
nephew in the house, and he was glad of 
the chance to bend his head while Miss 
Marilla softly asked a blessing on the 
meal. He had been wont to think he 
could get away with any situation; but 
he began to feel now as if his recent 
troubles had unnerved him, and he 
might make a mess of this one. Some¬ 
how that girl seemed as if she could see 
into a fellow’s heart. Why couldn’t he 


THE BIG BLUE SOLDIER 


51 


show her how he despised the whole race 
of false-hearted womankind? 

They heaped his plate with good 
things, poured him amber coffee rich 
with cream, gave him cranberry sauce 
and pickles and olives, and passed little 
delicate biscuits, and butter with the 
fragrance of roses. With all this be¬ 
fore him he suddenly felt as if he could 
not swallow a mouthful. He lifted his 
eyes to the opposite wall, and a neatly 
framed sentence in quaint old English 
lettering met his eye, “Who crowneth 
thee with loving-kindness and tender 
mercies, so that thy youth is renewed 
like the eagle’s.” 

An intense desire to put his head 
down on the table and cry came over 
him. The warmth of the room, the 
fragrance of the food, had made him 
conscious of an ache in every part of 
his body. His head was throbbing too, 
and he wondered what was the matter 


52 THE BIG BLUE SOLDIER 

with him. After all the harshness of 
the world, and the bitterness, to meet 
a kindness like this seemed to unnerve 
him. But gradually the food got in its 
work, and the hot coffee stimulated 
him. He rose to the occasion greatly. 
He described France, spoke of the 
beautiful cathedrals he had seen, the 
works of art, the little children, the 
work of reconstruction that was going 
on, spoke of Germany too, when he saw 
they expected him to have been there, 
although this was a shoal on which he 
almost wrecked his role before he re¬ 
alized. He told of the voyage over and 
the people he had met, and he kept most 
distinctly away from anything per¬ 
sonal, at least as far away as Mary 
Amber would let him. She with her 
keen, questioning eyes was always 
bringing up some question that was al¬ 
most impossible for him to answer di¬ 
rectly without treading on dangerous 


THE BIG BLUE SOLDIER 


53 


ground, and it required skill indeed to 
turn her from it. Mary listened and 
marvelled, trying continually to trace 
In his face the lines of the fat-faced, ar¬ 
rogant child who used to torment her. 

Mary rose to take the plates, and the 
young soldier insisted on helping. Miss 
Marilla, pleased to see them getting 
on so nicely, sat smiling in her place, 
reaching out to brush away a stray 
crumb on the table-cloth. Mary, lin¬ 
gering in the kitchen for a moment, to 
be sure the fire was not being neglected, 
lifted the stove-lid, and with the 
draught a little flame leaped up around 
a crumpled, smoldering yellow paper 
with the familiar “Western Union Tel¬ 
egraph” heading. Three words stood 
out distinctly for a second, “Impos¬ 
sible to accept,” and then were 
enveloped by the flame. Mary stood 
and stared with the stove-lid in her hand, 
and then, as the flame curled the paper 


54 THE BIG BLUE SOLDIER 

over, she saw “Lieutenant Richard—” 
revealed and immediately licked up by 
the flame. 

It lay, a little crisp, black fabric 
with its message utterly illegible, but 
still Mary stood and stared and won¬ 
dered. She had seen the boy on the 
bicycle ride up and go away. She had 
also seen the approaching soldier al¬ 
most immediately, and the thought of 
the telegram had been at once erased. 
Now it came back forcefully. Dick, 
then, had sent a telegram, and it looked 
as if he had declined the invitation. 
Who, then, was this stranger at the 
table? Some comrade working Miss 
Marilla for a dinner, or Dick himself, 
having changed his mind or playing a 
practical joke? In any case Mary felt 
she ought to disapprove of him utterly. 
It was her duty to show him up to Miss 
Marilla; and yet how could she do it 


THE BIG BLUE SOLDIER 


55 


when she did not know anything 
herself? 

“Hurry, Mary, and bring the pie,” 
called Miss Marilla. “We’re waiting.” 

Mary put the stove-lid down, and 
went slowly, thoughtfully back to the 
dining-room bearing a pie. She studied 
the face of the young soldier intently 
as she passed him his pie, but he seemed 
so young and pleasant and happy she 
hadn’t the heart to say anything just 
yet. She would bide her time. Per¬ 
haps somehow it was all explainable. 
So she set to asking him questions. 

“By the way, Hick, what ever be¬ 
came of Barker?” she requested, fixing 
her clear eyes on his face. 

“Barker?” said Lyman Gage, puz¬ 
zled and polite, then, remembering his 
role, “Oh, yes, Barker!” He laughed. 
“Great old Barker, wasn’t he?” He 
turned in troubled appeal to Miss 
Marilla. 


56 


THE BIG BLUE SOLDIER 


"Barker certainly was the cutest lit¬ 
tle guinea-pig I ever saw,” beamed 
Miss Marilla, "although at the time I 
really wasn’t as fond of it as you were. 
You would have it around in the 
kitchen so much.” 

There was covert apology in Miss 
Marilla’s voice for the youthful char¬ 
acter of the young man he was sup¬ 
posed to be. 

“I should judge I must have been a 
good deal of a nuisance in those days,” 
hazarded the soldier, feeling that he 
was treading on dangerous ground. 

"Oh, no!” sighed Miss Marilla, try¬ 
ing to be truthful and at the same time 
polite. "Children will be children, you 
know.” 

"All children are not alike.” It was 
as near to snapping as sweet Mary Am¬ 
ber ever came. She had memories 
which time had not dimmed. 


THE BIG BLUE SOLDIER 


57 


“Was it as bad as that?” laughed the 
young man. “I’m sorry!” 

Mary had to laugh. His frankness 
certainly was disarming. But there 
was that telegram! And Mary grew 
serious again. She did not intend to 
have her gentle old friend deceived. 

Mary insisted on clearing off the 
table and washing the dishes, and the 
soldier insisted on helping her; so Miss 
Marilla, much disturbed that domestic 
duties should interfere with the even¬ 
ing, put everything away, and made the 
task as brief as possible, looking anx¬ 
iously at Mary Amber every trip 
back from the refrigerator and pantry 
to see how she was getting on with the 
strange soldier, and how the strange 
soldier was getting on with her. At 
first she was a little troubled lest he 
shouldn’t be the land of man she would 
want to introduce to Mary timber; but 
after she had heard him talk and ex- 


58 THE BIG BLUE SOLDIER 

* 

press such thoroughly wholesome 
views on politics and national subjects 
she almost forgot he was not the real 
Dick, and her doting heart could not 
help wanting Mary Amber to like him. 
He was, in fact, the personification of 
the Dick she had dreamed out for her 
own, as different in fact from the real 
Dick as could have been imagined, and 
a great deal better. His frank eyes, his 
pleasant manner, his cultured voice, all 
pleased her; and she couldn’t help feel¬ 
ing that he was Dick come back as she 
would have liked him to be all the time. 

“I’d like to have a little music, just 
a little before Mary has to go home,” 
Miss Marilla said wistfully as Mary 
Amber hung up the dish-towel with an 
air that said plainly without words that 
she felt her duty toward the stranger 
was over and she was going to depart 
at once. 


THE BIG BLUE SOLDIER 


59 


“Sure!” said the stranger. “You 
sing, don’t you, Miss Mary?” 

There was nothing for it, and Mary 
resigned herself to another half hour. 
They went into the parlor; and Mary 
sat down at the old square piano, and 
touched its asthmatic keys that sounded 
the least bit tin-panny even under such 
skilled fingers as hers. 

“What shall I play?” questioned 
Mary. “ ‘The long, long trail’?” 
There was a bit of sarcasm in her tone. 
Mary was a real musician, and hated 
rag-time. 

“No! Never!” said the soldier 
quickly. “I mean—not that, please 
and a look of such bitter pain swept 
over his face that Mary glanced up sur¬ 
prised, and forgot to be disagreeable 
for several minutes while she pondered 
his expression. 

“Excuse me,” he said. “But I loathe 
it. Give us something else; sing some- 


60 THE BIG BLUE SOLDIER 

thing real. I’m sure you can.” There 
was a hidden compliment in his tone, 
and Mary was surprised. The soldier 
had almost forgotten that he did not be¬ 
long there. He was acting as he might 
have acted in his own social sphere. 

Mary struck a few chords tenderly 
on the piano, and then broke into the 
delicious melody of “The Spirit 
Flower;” and Lyman Gage forgot that 
he was playing a part in a strange 
home with a strange girl, forgot that he 
hadn’t a cent in the world, and his girl 
was gone, and sat watching her face 
as she sang. For Mary had a voice 
like a thrush in the summer evening, 
that liquid appeal that always reminds 
one of a silver spoon dropped into a 
glass of water; and Mary had a face 
like the spirit flower itself. As she 
sang she could not help living, breath¬ 
ing, being the words she spoke. 

There was nothing, absolutely noth- 


61 


THE BIG BLUE SOLDIER 

ing, about Mary to remind him of the 
girl he had lost; and there was some¬ 
thing in her sweet, serious demeanor as 
she sang to call to his better nature; a 
wholesome, serious sweetness that was 
in itself a kind of antiseptic against bit¬ 
terness and sweeping denunciation. 
Lyman Gage as he listened was lifted 
out of himself and set in a new world 
where men and women thought of 
something besides money and position 
and social prestige. He seemed to be 
standing off apart from himself and 
seeing himself from a new angle, an 
angle in which he was not the only one 
that mattered in this world, and in 
which he got a hint that his plans might 
be only hindrances to a larger life for 
himself and every one else. Not that he 
exactly thought these things in so many 
words. It was more as if while Mary 
sang a wind blew freshly from a place 
where such thoughts were crowding, 


62 THE BIG BLUE SOLDIER 

and made him seem smaller in his own 
conceit than he had thought he was. 

“And now sing ‘Laddie,’ ” pleaded 
Miss Marilla. 

A wave of annoyance swept over 
Mary Amber’s face. It was plain she 
did not wish to sing that song. Never¬ 
theless, she sang it, forgetting herself 
and throwing all the pathos and ten¬ 
derness into her voice that belonged to 
the beautiful words. Then she turned 
from the piano decidedly, and rose. 
“I must go home at once,” was written 
in every line of her attitude. Miss Ma¬ 
rilla rose nervously, and looked from 
one of her guests to the other. 

“Dick, I wonder if you haven’t 
learned to sing.” 

Her eyes were so pathetic that they 
stirred the young man to her service. 
Besides, there was something so con¬ 
temptuous in the attitude of that hu¬ 
man spirit flower standing on the wing 


THE BIG BLUE SOLDIER 63 

as it were in that done-with-him-for- 
ever attitude that spurred him into a 
faint desire to show her what he 
could do. 

“Why, sure!” he answered lazily, and 
with a stride transferred himself to the 
piano-stool and struck a deep, strong 
chord or two. Suddenly there poured 
forth a wondrous barytone such as was 
seldom heard in Purling Brook, and 
indeed is not common anywhere. He 
had a feeling that he was paying for his 
wonderful dinner, and must do his best. 
The first song that had come to his 
mind was a big, blustery French patri¬ 
otic song; and the very spirit of the 
march was in its cadence. Out of the 
corner of his eye he could see Mary 
Amber still poised, but waiting in her 
astonishment. He felt that he had al¬ 
ready scored a point. When he came 
to the grand climax, she cried out with 
pleasure and clapped her hands. Miss 


64 THE BIG BLUE SOLDIER 

Marilla had sunk into the mahogany 
rocker, but was sitting on the edge, 
alert to prolong this gala evening; and 
two bright spots of colorful delight 
shone on her faded cheeks. 

He did not wait for them to ask him 
for another ; he dashed into a minor key, 
and began to sing a wild, sweet, sob¬ 
bing song of love and loss till Mary, 
entranced, softly slipped into a chair, 
and sat breathless with clasped hands 
and shining eyes. It was such an artis¬ 
tic, perfect thing, that song, that she 
forgot everything else while it was 
going on. 

When the last sob died away, and 
the little parlor was silent with deep 
feeling, he whirled about on the piano- 
stool, and rose briskly. 

“Now I’ve done my part, am I to 
be allowed to see the lady home?” 

He looked at Miss Marilla instead of 


THE BIG BLUE SOLDIER 


65 


Mary for permission, and she smiled, 
half frightened. 

“It isn’t necessary at all,” spoke 
Mary crisply, rising and going for a 
wrap. “It’s only a step.” 

“Oh, I think so, surely!” answered 
Miss Marilla as if a great point of eti¬ 
quette had been decided. She gave him 
a look of perfect trust. 

“It’s only across the garden and 
through the hedge, you know,” she said 
in a low tone; “but I think she would 
appreciate it.” 

“Certainly,” he said, and turned with 
perfect courtesy as Mary looked in at 
the door and called, “Good night.” 

He did not make a fuss about attend¬ 
ing her. He simply was there close be¬ 
side her as she sped through the dark 
without a word to him. 

“It’s been very pleasant to meet you,” 
he said as she turned with a motion of 

dismissal at her own steps, “again,” he 

s 


66 


THE BIG BLUE SOLDIER 


added lamely. “I—I’ve enjoyed the 
evening more than you can understand. 
I enjoyed your singing.” 

“Oh! My singing!” flung back Mary. 
“Why, I was like a sparrow beside a 
nightingale. It wasn’t quite fair of you 
to let me sing first without knowing 
you had a voice. It’s strange. You 
know you never used to sing.” 

It seemed to him her glance went 
deep as she looked at him through the 
shadows of the garden. He thought 
about it as he crept back through the 
hedge, shivering now, for the night was 
keen and his uniform was thin. Well, 
what did it matter what she thought? 
He would soon be far away from her 
and never likely to see her again. Yet 
he was glad he had scored a point, one 
point against Girl in the concrete. 

Now he must go in and bid his hos¬ 
tess good-by, and then away to—where? 


CHAPTER IV 


As Lyman Gage went up the steps 
to Miss Manila’s front porch a sick 
thrill of cold and weariness passed over 
his big frame. Every joint and muscle 
seemed to cry out in protest, and his 
very vitals seemed sore and racked. The 
bit of bright evening was over, and he 
was facing his own gray life again with 
a future that was void and empty. 

But the door was not shut. Miss 
Marilla was hovering anxiously inside 
with the air of just having retreated 
from the porch. She gave a little re¬ 
lieved gasp as he entered. 

“Oh, I was afraid you wouldn’t 
come back,” she said eagerly. “And I 
did so want to thank you and tell you 
how we—how I—yes, I mean we, for 
I know she loved that singing—how 
very much we have enjoyed it. I shall 

67 


68 


THE BIG BLUE SOLDIER 


always thank God that He sent you 
along just then.” 

“Well, I certainly have cause to 
thank you for that wonderful dinner,” 
he said earnestly, as he might have 
spoken to a dear relation, “and for all 
this”—he waved his big hand toward 
the bright room—“this pleasantness. 
It was like coming home, and I haven’t 
any home to come to now.” 

“Oh! Haven’t you?” said Miss Ma¬ 
nila caressingly.” “Oh, haven't you?” 
she said again wistfully. “I wonder 
why I can’t keep you a little while, then. 
You seem just like my own nephew— 
as I had hoped he would be—I haven’t 
seen him in a long time. Where were 
you going when I stopped you?” 

The young man lifted heavy eyes 
that were bloodshot and sore to the 
turning, and tried to smile. To save 
his life he couldn’t lie blithely when it 


THE BIG BLUE SOLDIER 69 

seemed so good to be in that warm 
room. 

“Why—I was—I don’t know—I 
guess I just wasn’t going anywhere. 
To tell you the truth, I was all in, and 
down on my luck, and as blue as indigo 
when you met me. I was just tramp¬ 
ing anywhere to get away from it.” 

“You poor boy!” said Miss Marilla, 
putting out her fine little blue-veined 
hands and caressing the old khaki 
sleeve. “Well, then you’re just going 
to stay with me and get rested. There’s 
no reason in the world why you 
shouldn’t.” 

“No, indeed!” said Lyman Gage, 
drawing himself up bravely, “I couldn’t 
think of it. It wouldn’t be right. But 
I certainly thank you with all my heart 
for what you have done for me to-night. 

I really must go at once.” 

“But where?” she asked pathetically, 
as if he belonged to her, sliding her 


70 


THE BIG BLUE SOLDIER 


hands detainingly down to his big 
rough ones. 

“Oh, anywhere, it doesn’t matter 1” 
he said, holding her delicate little old 
hand in his with a look of sacred respect 
as if a nice old angel had offered to hold 
hands with him. “I’m a soldier, you 
know; and a few storms more or less 
won’t matter. I’m used to it. Good 
night.” 

He clasped her hands a moment, and 
was about to turn away; but she held 
his fingers eagerly. 

“You shall not go that way!” she 
declared. “Out into the cold without 
any overcoat, and no home to go to! 
Your hands are hot, too. I believe you 
have a fever. You’re going to stay 
here to-night and have a good sleep 
and a warm breakfast; and then, if you 
must go, all right. My spare bed is all 
made up, and there’s a fire in the 
Franklin heater. The room’s as warm 


THE BIG BLUE SOLDIER 


71 


as toast, and Mary put a big bouquet 
of chrysanthemums up there. If you 
don’t sleep there, it will all be wasted. 
You must stay.” 

“No, it wouldn’t be right,” He 
shook his head again, and smiled wist¬ 
fully. “What would people say?” 

“Say! Why, they’ve got it in the 
paper that you’re to be here—at least, 
that Dick’s to be here. They’ll think 
you’re my nephew and think nothing 
else about it. Besides, I guess I have 
a right to have company if I like.” 

“If there was any way I could pay 
you,” said the young man. “But I 
haven’t a cent to my name, and no tell¬ 
ing how long before I will have any¬ 
thing. I really couldn’t accept any 
such hospitality.” 

“Oh, that’s all right,” said Miss Ma- 
rilla cheerily. “You can pay me if you 
like, sometime when you get plenty; or 
perhaps you’ll take me in when I’m 



72 


THE BIG BLUE SOLDIER 


having a hard time. Anyhow, you’re 
going to stay. I won’t take no for an 
answer. I’ve been disappointed and 
disappointed about Dick’s coming, and 
me having no one to show for all the 
years of the war, just making sweaters 
for the world, it seemed like, with no 
one belonging to me; and now I’ve got 
a soldier, and I’m going to keep him at 
least for one night. Nobody’s to know 
but you’re my own nephew, and I 
haven’t got to go around the town, 
have I, telling that Dick didn’t care 
enough for his old country aunt to come 
out and take dinner with her ? It’s noth¬ 
ing to them, is it, if they think he 
came and stayed overnight too? Or 
even a few days. Nobody ’ll be any the 
wiser, and I’ll take a lot more comfort.” 

“I’d like to accommodate you,” fal¬ 
tered the soldier; “but you know I 
really ought—” Suddenly the big fel¬ 
low was seized with a fit of sneezing. 


THE BIG BLUE SOLDIER 73 

and the sick sore thrills danced all 
down his back, and slapped him in the 
face, and pricked him in the throat, and 
banged against his head. He dropped 
weakly down in a chair, and got out the 
discouragedest-looking handkerchief 
that ever a soldier carried. It looked 
as if it might have washed the decks on 
the way over, or wiped off shoes, as 
doubtless it had; and it left a dull streak 
of olive-drab dust on his cheek and 
chin when he had finished polishing off 
the last sneeze and lifted his suffering 
eyes to his hostess. 

“You’re sick!” declared Miss Marilla 
with a kind of satisfaction, as if now 
she had got something she could really 
take hold of. “I’ve thought it all the 
evening. I first laid it to the wind in 
your face, for I knew you weren’t the 
drinking kind; and then I thought 
maybe you’d had to be up all night last 
night or something; lack of sleep makes 


74 


THE BIG BLUE SOLDIER 


eyes look that way; but I believe you’ve 
got the grippe, and I’m going to put 
you to bed and give you some homeo¬ 
pathic medicine. Come, tell me the 
truth. Aren’t you chilly?” 

With a half-sheepish smile the soldier 
admitted that he was, and a big in¬ 
voluntary shudder ran over his tall 
frame with the admission. 

“Well, it’s high time we got to work. 
There’s plenty of hot water; and you 
go up to the bathroom, and take a hot 
bath. I’ll put a hot-water bag in the 
bed, and get it good and warm; and 
I’ve got a long, warm flannel night¬ 
gown I guess you can get on. It was 
made for grandmother, and she was a 
big woman. Come, we’ll go right up¬ 
stairs. I can come down and shut up 
the house while you’re taking your 
bath.” 

The soldier protested, but Miss Ma¬ 
nila swept all before her. She locked 


THE BIG BLUE SOLDIER 


75 


the front door resolutely, and put the 
chain on. She turned out the parlor 
light, and shoved the young man before 
her to the stairs. 

“But I oughtn’t to,” he protested 
again with one foot on the first step. 
“I’m an utter stranger.” 

“Well, what’s that?” said Miss Ma¬ 
nila crisply. “ T was a stranger, and 
ye took me in.’ When it comes to that, 
we’re all strangers. Come, hurry up; 
you ought to be in bed. You’ll feel 
like a new man when I get you 
tucked up.” 

“You’re awfully good, ”he murmured, 
stumbling up the stairs, with a sick 
realization that he was giving way to 
the little imps of chills and thrills that 
were dancing over him, that he was all 
in, and in a few minutes more he would 
be a contemptible coward, letting a 
lone, old woman fuss over him this way. 

Miss Marilla turned up the light, 


76 


THE BIG BLUE SOLDIER 


and threw back the covers of the spare 
bed, sending a whiff of lavender 
through the room. The Franklin 
heater glowed cheerfully, and the place 
was warm as toast. There was some¬ 
thing sweet and homelike in the old- 
fashioned room with its queer, ancient 
framed photographs of people long 
gone, and its plain but fine old mahog¬ 
any. The soldier raised his bloodshot 
eyes, and looked about with a thankful 
wish that he felt well enough to ap¬ 
preciate it all. 

Miss Marilla had pulled open a 
drawer, and produced a long, fine flan¬ 
nel garment of nondescript fashion; 
and from a closet she drew forth a long 
pink bathrobe and a pair of felt 
slippers. 

“There! I guess you can get those 
on. 

She bustled into the bathroom, turned 
on the hot water, and heaped big 


THE BIG BLUE SOLDIER 77 

white bath-towels and sweet-scented 
soap upon him. In a kind of daze of 
thankfulness he stumbled into the bath¬ 
room, and began his bath. He hadn’t 
had a bath like that in—was it two 
years? Somehow the hot water held 
down the nasty little sick thrills, and 
cut out the chills for the time. It was 
wonderful to feel clean and warm, and 
smell the freshness of the towels and 
soap. He climbed into the big night¬ 
gown which also smelled of lavender, 
and came forth presently with the felt 
slippers on the front of his feet, and the 
pink bathrobe trailing around his 
shoulders. There was a meek, con¬ 
quered expression on his face; and he 
crept gratefully into the warm bed ac¬ 
cording to directions, and snuggled 
down with that sick, sore thrill of 
thankfulness that everybody who has 
ever had grippe knows. 

Miss Marilla bustled up from down- 


78 


THE BIG BLUE SOLDIER 


stairs with a second hot-water bag in 
one hand and a thermometer in the 
other. 

“I’m going to take your tempera¬ 
ture,” she said briskly, and stuck the 
thermometer into his unresisting mouth. 
Somehow it was wonderfully sweet to 
be fussed over this way, ahnost like 
having a mother. He hadn’t had such 
care since he was a little fellow in the 
hospital at prep school. 

“X thought so!” said Miss Marilla, 
casting a practised eye at the ther¬ 
mometer a moment later. “You’ve got 
quite a fever; and you’ve got to lie right 
still, and do as X say, or you’ll have a 
time of it. I hate to think what would 
have happened to you if I’d been weak 
enough to let you go off into the cold 
without any overcoat to-night.” 

“Oh, I’d have walked it off likely,” 
faintly spoke the old Adam in the 
sleepy, sick soldier; but he knew as he 


79 


THE BIG BLUE SOLDIER 

spoke that he was lying, and he knew 
Miss Marilla knew it also. He would 
have laughed if it hadn’t been too much 
trouble. It was wonderful to be in a 
bed like this, and be warm, and that 
ache in his back against the hot-water 
bag! It almost made his head stop 
aching. 

In almost no time at all he was asleep. 
He never realized when Miss Marilla 
brought a glass, and fed him medicine. 
He opened his mouth obediently when 
she told him, and went right on sleeping. 

“Bless his heart!” she said. “He 
must have been all worn out;” and she 
turned the light low, and gathering up 
his chairful of clothes, slipped away to 
the bathroom, where presently they 
were all, except the shoes, soaking in 
strong, hot soap-suds, and Miss Marilla 
had gone downstairs to stir up the fire 
and put on irons. But she took the pre¬ 
caution to close all the blinds on the 


80 


THE BIG BLUE SOLDIER 


Amber side of the house, and pull down 
the shades. Mary had no need ever to 
find out what she was doing. 

The night wore on, and Miss Marilla 
wrought with happy heart and willing 
hands. She was doing something for 
somebody who really needed it, and who 
for the time being had no one else to do 
for him. He was hers exclusively to be 
served this night. It was years since 
she had had anybody of her own to care 
for, and she luxuriated in the service. 

Every hour she slipped up to feel 
his forehead, listen to his breathing, 
and give him his medicine, and then 
slipped down to the kitchen again to her 
ironing. Garment by garment the sol¬ 
dier’s meagre outfit came from the 
steaming suds, was conveyed to the 
kitchen, where it hung on an improvised 
line over the range, and got itself dry 
enough to be ironed and patched. It 
was a work of love, and therefore it 


THE BIG BLUE SOLDIER 


81 


was done perfectly. When morning 
dawned the soldier’s outfit, thoroughly 
renovated and pressed almost beyond 
recognition, lay on a chair by the spare- 
room window, and Miss Marilla in her 
dark-blue serge morning-dress lay 
tidily down on the outside of her bed to 
take “forty winks.” But even then she 
could hardly get to sleep, she was so ex¬ 
cited thinking about her guest and won¬ 
dering whether he would feel better 
when he awoke or whether she ought to 
send for a doctor. 

A hoarse cough roused her an hour 
later, and she went with speed to her 
patient, and found him tossing and bat¬ 
tling in his sleep with some imagi¬ 
nary foe. 

“I don’t owe you a cent any longer I” 
he declared fiercely. “I’ve paid it all, 
even to the interest while I was in 
France; and there’s no reason why I 

shouldn’t tell you just what I think of 

6 


82 


THE BIG BLUE SOLDIER 


you. You can go to thunder with your 
kind offers. I’m off you for life!” And 
then the big fellow turned with a groan 
of anguish, and buried his face in 
his pillow. 

Miss Marilla paused in horror, think¬ 
ing she had intruded upon some secret 
meditation; but, as she waited on tip¬ 
toe and breathless in the hall, she heard 
the steady hoarse breathing keep on, 
and knew that he was still asleep. He 
did not rouse, more than to open blood¬ 
shot, unseeing eyes and close them 
again when she loudly stirred his medi¬ 
cine in the glass and held the spoon to 
his lips. As before, he obediently 
opened his mouth and swallowed, and 
went on sleeping. 

She stood a moment anxiously watch¬ 
ing him. She did not know just what 
she ought to do. Perhaps he was going 
to have pneumonia! Perhaps she ought 
to send for the doctor, and yet there 


THE BIG BLUE SOLDIER 


83 


were complications about that. She 
would be obliged to explain a lot—or 
else lie to the neighborhood! And he 
might not like it for her to call a doctor 
while he was asleep. If she only had 
some one with whom to advise! On or¬ 
dinary questions she always consulted 
Mary Amber, but by the very nature 
of the case Mary Amber was out of 
this. Besides, in half an hour Mary 
Amber very discreetly put herself be¬ 
yond a question outside of any touch 
with Miss Manila’s visitor by taking 
herself off in her little runabout for a 
short visit to a college friend over in the 
next county. It was plain that Mary 
Amber did not care to subject herself 
to further contact with the young sol¬ 
dier. He might be Dick or he might 
not be Dick. It was none of her busi¬ 
ness while she was visiting Jeannette 
Clark; so she went away quite hurriedly. 
Miss Marilla heard the purr of the 



84 


THE BIG BLUE SOLDIER 


engine as the little brown car started 
down the hedged driveway, and 
watched the flight with a sense of satis¬ 
faction. She had an intuition that 
Mary Amber was not in favor of her 
soldier, and she had a guilty sense of 
hiding the truth from her dear young 
friend that made her breathe more 
freely as she watched Mary Amber’s 
flight. Moreover, it was with a certain 
self-reproachful relief that she noted 
the little brown suitcase that lay at 
Mary Amber’s feet as she slid past Miss 
Manila’s house without looking up. 
Maiy Amber was going away for the 
day at least, probably overnight; and 
by that time the question of the soldier 
would be settled one way or the other 
without Mary Amber’s having to 
worry about it. 

Miss Marilla ordered a piece of beef, 
and brewed a cup of the most delicious 
beef-tea, which she took up-stairs. She 


THE BIG BLUE SOLDIER 85 

managed to get her soldier awake 
enough to swallow it; but it was plain 
that he did not in the least realize 
where he was, and seemed well content 
to close his eyes and drowse away once 
more. Miss Marilla was deeply troub¬ 
led. Some pricks from the old, time¬ 
worn adage beginning, “O what a tang¬ 
led web we weave,” began to stab her 
conscience. If only she had not allowed 
those paragraphs to go into the county 
paper! No, that was not the real 
trouble at all. If only she had not 
dragged in another soldier, and made 
Mary Amber believe he was her 
nephew! Such an old fool! Just be¬ 
cause she couldn’t bear the mortification 
of having people know her nephew 
hadn’t cared enough for her to come and 
see her when he was close at hand! But 
she was well punished. Here she had a 
strange sick man on her hands, and no 


86 THE BIG BLUE SOLDIER 

end of responsibility! Oh, if only she 
hadn’t asked him in! 

Yet, as she stood watching the quick 
little throb in his neck above the old 
flannel nightgown, and the long, curly 
sweep of the dark lashes on his hot 
cheek as he slept, her heart cried out 
against that wish. No, a thousand 
times no. If she had not asked him in, 
he might have been in some hospital by 
this time, cared for by strangers; and 
she would have been alone, with empty 
hands, getting her own solitary dinner, 
or sewing on the aprons for the orphan¬ 
age, with nothing in the world to do 
that really mattered for anybody. 
Somehow her heart went out to this 
stranger boy with a great yearning, and 
he had come to mean her own—or 
what her own ought to have been to her. 
She wouldn’t have him otherwhere for 
anything. She wanted him right where 
he was for her to care for, something at 


87 


THE BIG BLUE SOLDIER 

last that needed her, something she 

could love and tend, even if it were only 

\ 

for a few days. 

And she was sure she could care for 
him. She knew a lot about sickness. 
People sent for her to help them out, 
and her wonderful nursing had often 
saved a life where the doctor’s remedies 
had failed. She felt sure this was only 
a severe case of grippe that had taken 
fierce hold on the system. Thorough 
rest, careful nursing, nourishing broth, 
and some of her homeopathic remedies 
would work the charm. She would try 
it a little longer and see. If his tem¬ 
perature wasn’t higher than the last 
time, it would be perfectly safe to get 
along without a doctor. 

She put the thermometer between 
his relaxed lips, and held them firmly 
round it until she was sure it had been 
there long enough. Then she carried it 
Softly over to the front window, and 


88 


THE BIG BLUE SOLDIER 


studied it. No, it had not risen; in fact, 
it might be a fifth of a degree lower. 

Well, she would venture it a little 
while longer. 

For two days Miss Marilla cared for 
her strange soldier as only a born nurse 
like herself could care, and on the third 
morning he rewarded her by opening 
his eyes and looking about; then, meet¬ 
ing her own anxious gaze, he gave her 
a weak smile. 

“I’ve been sick!” he said as if stating 
an astonishing fact to himself. “I 
must have given you a lot of trouble.” 

“Not a bit of it, you dear child,” 
said Miss Marilla, and then stooped and 
brushed his forehead with her lips in a 
motherly kiss. “I’m so glad you’re 
better!” 

She passed her hand like soft old 
fallen rose-leaves over his forehead, and 
it was moist. She felt of his hands, and 
they were moist too. She took his tern- 


THE BIG BLUE SOLDIER 


89 


perature, and it had gone down almost 
to normal. Her eyes were shining with 
more than professional joy and relief. 
He had become to her in these hours of 
nursing and anxiety as her own child. 

But at the kiss the boy’s eyelashes 
had swept down upon his cheek; and, 
when she looked up from reading the 
thermometer, she saw a tear glisten un¬ 
willingly beneath the lashes. 

The next two days were a time of 
untold joy to Miss Marilla while she 
petted and nursed her soldier boy back 
to some degree of his normal strength. 
She treated him just as if he were a 
little child who had dropped from the 
skies to her loving ministrations. She 
bathed his face, and puffed up his pil¬ 
lows, and took his temperature, and 
dosed him, and fed him, and read him to 
sleep—and Miss Marilla could read 
well, too; she was always asked to read 
the chapter at the Fortnightly Club 


90 


THE BIG BLUE SOLDIER 


whenever the regular reader whose turn 
it was failed. And while he was asleep 
she cooked dainty, appetizing little 
dishes for him. They had a wonderful 
time together, and he enjoyed it as 
much as she did. The fact was he was 
too weak to object, for the little red 
devils that get into the blood and kick 
up the fight commonly entitled grippe 
had done a thorough work with him; 
and he was, as he put it, 4 ‘all in and 
then some.” 

He seemed to have gone back to the 
days of his childhood since the fever be¬ 
gan to abate, and he lay in a sweet daze 
of comfort and rest. His troubles and 
perplexities and loneliness had dropped 
away from him, and he felt no desire 
to think of them. He was having the 
time of his life. 

Then suddenly, wholly unannounced 
and not altogether desired at the present 
stage of the game, Mary Amber arrived 
on the scene. 


CHAPTER V 

Mary was radiant as the sunny 
morning in a little red tam, and her 
cheeks as red as her hat from the drive 
across country. She appeared at the 
kitchen door quite in her accustomed 
way just as Miss Marilla was lifting 
the dainty tray to carry her boy’s break¬ 
fast up-stairs, and she ahnost dropped 
it in her dismay. 

“I’ve had the grandest time!” 
breezed Mary gayly. “You don’t 
know how beautiful the country is, all 
wonderful bronze and brown with a 
purple haze, and a frost like silver lace 
this morning when I started. You’ve 
simply got to put on your wraps and 
come with me for a little while. I know 
a place where the shadows melt slowly, 
and the frost will not be gone yet. 
Come quick! I want you to see it be- 

91 


92 THE BIG BLUE SOLDIER 

fore it’s too late. You’re not just eat¬ 
ing your breakfast, Auntie Rill! And 
on a tray, too! Are you sick?” 

Miss Marilla glanced guiltily down 
at the tray, too transparent even to 
evade the question. 

“No, why—I—he—my neph-” 

then she stopped in hopeless confusion, 
remembering her resolve not to tell a 
lie about the matter, whatever came. 

Mary Amber stood up and looked at 
her, her keen young eyes searching and 
finding the truth. 

“You don’t mean to tell me that man 
is here yet? And you waiting on him!” 

There were both sorrow and scorn in 
the fine young voice. 

In the upper hall the sick soldier in a 
bathrobe was hanging over the banis¬ 
ters in a panic, wishing some kind fairy 
would arrive and waft him away on a 
breath. All his perfidy in getting sick 
on a strange gentlewoman’s hands and 





THE BIG BLUE SOLDIER 93 

lying lazily in bed, letting her wait on 
him, was shown up in Mary Amber’s 
voice. It found its echo in his own 
strong soul. He had known all along 
that he had no business there, that he 
ought to have gone out on the road to 
die rather than betray the sweet hospi¬ 
tality of Miss Marilla by allowing him¬ 
self to be a selfish, lazy slob—that was 
what he called himself as he hung over 
the banisters. 

“Mary! Why, he has been very 
sick r 

“Sick?” There was a covert sneer 
in Mary Amber’s incredulous young 
voice; and then the conversation was 
suddenly blanketed by the closing of 
the hall door, and the sick soldier pad¬ 
ded disconsolately back to bed, weak 
and dizzy, but determined. This was 
as good a time as any. He ought to 
have gone before! 

He trailed across the room in the big 


94 


THE BIG BLUE SOLDIER 


flannel nightgown that hung out from 
him with the outlines of a fat old auntie 
and dragged down from one bronzed 
shoulder rakishly. His hair was stick¬ 
ing up wildly, and he felt of his chin 
fiercely, and realized that he was wear¬ 
ing a growth of several days. 

In a neat pile on a chair he found his 
few clean garments, and struggled into 
them. His carefully ironed uniform 
hung in the closet; and he braced him¬ 
self, and struggled into the trousers. It 
seemed a tremendous effort. He longed 
to drop back on the pillows, but 
wouldn’t. He sat with his head in his 
hands, his elbows on his knees, trying 
to get courage to totter to the bathroom 
and subdue his hair and beard, when he 
heard Miss Marilla coming hastily up 
the stairs, the little coffee-pot sending 
on a delicious odor, and the glass of milk 
tinkling against the silver spoons as 
she came. 


THE BIG BLUE SOLDIER 


95 


He had managed his leggings by this 
time, and looked up with an attempt at 
a smile, trying to pass it off in a jocu¬ 
lar way. 

“I thought it was high time I was 
getting about,” he said, and broke 
down coughing. 

Miss Marilla paused in distress, and 
looked at his hollow eyes. Everything 
seemed to be going wrong this morning. 
Oh, why hadn’t Mary Amber stayed 
away just one day longer? But of 
course he had not heard her. 

“Oh, you’re not fit to be up yet!” 
she exclaimed. “Do lie down and rest 
till you’ve had your breakfast.” 

“I can’t be a baby having you wait 
on me any longer,” he said. “I’m 
ashamed of myself. I ought not to 
have stayed here at all!” His tone was 
savage, and he reached for his coat, and 
jammed it on with a determined air in 
spite of his weakness and the sore 


96 THE BIG BLUE SOLDIER 

shivers that crept shakily up his back. 
“I’m perfectly all right, and you’ve 
been wonderful; but it’s time I was 
moving on.” 

He pushed past her hurriedly to the 
bathroom, feeling that he must get out 
of her sight before his head began to 
swim. The water on his face would 
steady him. He dashed it on, and shiv¬ 
ered sickly, longing to plunge back to 
bed, yet keeping on with his ablutions. 

Miss Marilla put down her tray, and 
stood with tears in her eyes, waiting for 
him to return, trying to think what she 
could say to persuade him back to 
bed again. 

Her anxious expression softened him 
when he came back, and he agreed to 
eat his breakfast before he went any¬ 
where, and sank gratefully into the big 
chair in front of the Franklin heater, 
where she had laid out his breakfast on 
a little table. She had lined the chair 


THE BIG BLUE SOLDIER 97 

with a big comfortable, which she drew 
unobtrusively about his shoulders now, 
slipping a cushion under his feet, and 
quietly coddling him into comfort again. 
He looked at her gratefully, and, set¬ 
ting down his coffee-cup, reached out 
and patted her hair as she rose from 
tucking up his feet. 

“You’re just like a mother to me!” 
he choked, trying to keep back the 
emotion from his voice. “It’s been 
great! I can’t tell you!” 

“You’ve been just like a dear son,” 
she beamed, touching the dark hair 
over his forehead shyly. “It’s like get¬ 
ting my own back again to have you 
come for this little while, and to be able 
to do for you. You see it wasn’t as if I 
really had anybody. Dick never cared 
for me. I used to hope be would when 
he grew up. I used to think of him 
over there in danger, and pray for him, 

and love him, and send him sweaters; 

7 


98 


THE BIG BLUE SOLDIER 


but now I know it was really you I 
thought of and prayed for. Dick never 
cared.” 

He looked at her tenderly, and 
pressed her hand gratefully. 

“You’re wonderful!” he said. “I 
shall never forget it.” 

That little precious time while he was 
eating his breakfast made it all the 
harder for what he meant to do. He saw 
that he could never hope to do it openly, 
either; for she would fling herself in 
his path to prevent him from going out 
until he was well; so he let her tuck him 
up carefully on the spread-up bed, and 
pull down the shades for him to take a 
nap after the exertion of getting 
dressed; and he caught her hand, and 
kissed it fervently as she was leaving 
him; and cherished her murmured 
“Dear child!” and the pressure of her 
old-rose-leaf fingers in parting. Then 
he closed his eyes, and let her slip away 1 


THE BIG BLUE SOLDIER 99 

to the kitchen where he knew she would 
be some time preparing something 
delicious for his dinner. 

When she was safely out of hearing, 
rattling away at the kitchen stove, he 
threw back the covers vigorously, set 
his grim determination against the 
swimming head, stalked over to the. 
little desk, and wrote a note on the fine 
note-paper he found there. 

"Dear, wonderful little mother,” he 
wrote, "I can’t stay here any longer. It 
isn’t right. But I’ll be back some day 
to thank you if everything goes all 
right. Sincerely, Your Boy.” 

He tiptoed over, and laid it on the 
pillow; then he took his old trench-cap, 
which had been nicely pressed and was 
hanging on the corner of the looking- 
glass, and stealthily slid out of the 
pleasant, warm room, down the car¬ 
peted stairs, and out the front door into 
the crisp, cold morning. The chill air 



100 THE BIG BLUE SOLDIER 


met him with a challenge as he closed 
the front door, and dared him not to 
cough; but with an effort he held his 
breath, and crept down the front walk 
to the road, holding in control as well 
the long, violent shivers that seized him 
in their grasp. The sun met him, and 
blinded his sensitive eyes; and the wind 
with a tang of winter jeered at his thin 
uniform, and trickled up his sleeves 
and down his collar, penetrating every 
seam. But he stuffed his hands into 
his pockets, and strode grimly ahead 
on the way he had been going when 
Miss Marilla met him, passing the tall 
hedge where Mary Amber lived, and 
trying to hold his head high. He hoped 
Mary Amber saw him going away! 

For perhaps half a mile past Mary 
Amber’s house his courage and his 
pride held him, for he was a soldier, 
who had slept in a muck-pile under the 
rain, and held his nerve under fire, and 


THE BIG BLUE SOLDIER 101 


gone on foot ten miles to the hospital 
after he was wounded. What was a 
little grippe and a walk in the cold to 
the neighboring village? He wished 
he knew how far it was, but he had to 
go, for it would never do to send the 
telegram he must send from the town 
where Miss Marilla lived. 

The second half-mile he lagged and 
shivered, with not energy enough to 
keep up a circulation; the third half 
mile and the fourth were painful, and 
the fifth was completed in a sick daze 
of weakness; for the cold, though stim¬ 
ulating at first, had been getting in 
its work through his uniform, and he 
felt chilled to the very soul of him. His 
teeth were chattering, and he was blue 
around the lips when he staggered into 
the telegraph-office of Little Silverton. 
His fingers were almost too stiff to 
write, and his thoughts seemed to have 
congealed also, though he had been re- 


102 THE BIG BLUE SOLDIER 


peating the message all the way, word 
for word, with a vague feeling that he 
might forget it forever if he did not 
keep it going. 

“Will you send that collect ?” he 
asked the operator when he had finished 
writing. 

The girl took the blank, and read it 
carefully. 

“ Arthur J. Watkins, Esq., 

“ LaSalle Street, Chicago, Ill. 

“ Please negotiate a loan of five hundred dollars 
for me, using old house as collateral. Wire money 
immediately Little Silverton. Entirely out of funds. 
Have been sick. 

Lymax Gage. 

The girl read it through again, and 
then eyed him cautiously. 

“What’s your address?” she asked, 
giving a slow speculative chew to her 
gum. 

“I’ll wait here,” said the big blue 
soldier, sinking into a rush-bottomed 
chair by the desk. 


THE BIG BLUE SOLDIER 103 

“It might be some wait,” said the girl 
dryly, giving him another curious 
“once-over.” 

“I’ll wait!” he repeated fiercely, and 
dropped his aching head into his hands. 

The little instrument clicked away 
vigorously. In his fevered brain he 
fancied it writing on a typewriter at 
the other end of the line, and felt a 
curious impatience for his lawyer to 
read it and reply. How he wished it 
would hurry! 

The morning droned on, the tele¬ 
graph instrument chattered breezily, 
with the monotony of a sunny child that 
knows no larger world and is happy. 
Sometimes it seemed to Gage as if 
every click pierced his head and he was 
going crazy. The shivers were keeping 
in time running up and down his back, 
and chilling his very heart. The room 
was cold, cold, cold! How did that 
fool of a girl stand it in a pink trans- 


104 THE BIG BLUE SOLDIER 


parent blouse, showing her fat arms 
huskily? He shivered. Oh, for one 
of Miss Marilla’s nice thick blankets, 
and a hot-water bag! Oh, for the soft, 
warm bed, the quiet room, and Miss 
Marilla keeping guard! But he was a 
man—and a soldier! And every now 
and then would come Mary Amber’s 
keen accusing voice :Is that man here 
yet? And you waiting on him!” It 
was that that kept him up when he 
might have given way. He must show 
her he was a man, after all. “That 
man!” What had she meant? Did 
she, then, suspect him of being a fraud 
and not the real nephew? Well— 
shiver, shiver—what did he care? Let 
Mary Amber go to thunder! Or, if 
she didn’t want to go, he would go to 
thunder himself. He felt himself there 
already. 

Two hours went by. Now and then 
some one came in with a message, and 


THE BIG BLUE SOLDIER 105 


went out again. The girl behind the 
desk got out a pink sweater she was 
knitting, and chewed gum in time to 
her needles. Sometimes she eyed her 
companion curiously, but he did not 
stir nor look up. If there hadn’t been 
prohibition, she might have thought him 
drunk. She began to think about his 
message and weave a crude little ro¬ 
mance around him. She wondered 
whether he had been wounded. If he 
had given her half a chance, she would 
have asked him questions; but he sat 
there with his head in his hands like a 
stone image, and never seemed to know 
she was in the room. After a while it 
got on her nerves; and she took up her 
telephone, and carried on a gallery con¬ 
versation with a fellow laborer some¬ 
where up the line, giggling a good deal 
and telling about a movie she went to 
the night before. She used rare slang, 
with a furtive glance at the soldier for 


106 THE BIG BLUE SOLDIER 

developments; but he did not stir. Fi¬ 
nally she remarked loudly that it was 
getting noontime, and “so-longed” her 
friend, clicking the receiver into place. 

“I gotta go to lunch now,” she re¬ 
marked in an impersonal tone. “I have 
a nour off. This office is closed all 
noontime.” 

He did not seem to hear her; so she 
repeated it, and Gage looked up with 
bloodshot, heavy eyes. 

“What becomes of the message if it 
comes while you’re away?” he asked 
feverishly. 

“Oh, it’ll be repeated,” she replied 
easily. “You c’n cumbback bime-by, 
’bout two o’clock er later, ’n’ mebbe 
it’ll be here. I gotta lock up now.” 

Lyman Gage dragged himself to his 
feet, and looked dazedly about him; 
then he staggered out on the street. 

The sun hit him a clip in the eyes 
again that made him sick, and the wind 


THE BIG BLUE SOLDIER 107 

caught at his sleeves, and ran down his 
collar gleefully. The girl shut the door 
with a click, and turned the key, eyeing 
him doubtfully. He seemed to her very 
stupid for a soldier. If he had given her 
half a chance, she would have been 
friendly to him. She watched him drag 
down the street with an amused con¬ 
tempt, then turned to her belated lunch. 

Lyman Gage walked on down the 
road a little way, and then began to feel 
as if he couldn’t stand the cold a second 
longer, though he knew he must. His 
heart was behaving queerly, seeming to 
be absent from his body for whole sec¬ 
onds at a time, and then returning with 
leaps and bounds that almost suffocated 
him. He paused and looked around for 
a place to sit down, and, finding none, 
dropped down on the frozen ground at 
the roadside. It occurred to him that he 
ought to go back now while he was able, 


108 THE BIG BLUE SOLDIER 


for he was fast getting where from sheer 
weakness he couldn’t walk. 

He rested a moment, and then 
stumbled up and back toward Little 
Silverton. Automobiles passed him, 
and he remembered thinking that, if he 
weren’t so sick and queer in his head, he 
would try to stand in the road and stop 
one, and get them to carry him some¬ 
where. He had often done that in 
France, or even in this country during 
the war. But just now it seemed that 
he couldn’t do that, either. He had 
set out to prove to Mary Amber that he 
was a man and a soldier, and holding up 
automobiles wouldn’t be compatible 
with that idea. Then he realized that 
all this was crazy thinking, that Mary 
Amber had gone to thunder, and so had 
he, and it didn’t matter, anyway. All 
that mattered was for him to get that 
money and go back and pay Miss Ma¬ 
nila for taking care of him; and then 


THE BIG BLUE SOLDIER 109 

for him to take the next train back to 
the city, and get to a hospital. If he 
could only hold out long enough for 
that. But things were fast getting 
away from him. His head was hot and 
in a whirl, and his feet were so cold he 
thought they must be dead. 

Without realizing it he walked by the 
telegraph-office and on down the road 
toward Purling Brook again. 

The telegraph-girl watched him from 
the window of the tiny bakery where 
she ate her lunch. 

“There goes that poor boob now!” 
she said with her mouthful of pie a la 
mode. “He gets my goat! I hope he 
doesn’t come back. He’ll never get no 
answer to that telegram he sent. People 
ain’t goin’ round pickin’ up five hun¬ 
dred dollarses to send to broke soldiers 
these days. They got ’um all in Liberty 
Bonds. Say, Jess, gimme one more o’ 


110 THE BIG BLUE SOLDIER 


them chocolate eclairs, won’t you? I 
gotta get back.” 

About that time Lyman Gage had 
found a log by the wayside, and sunk 
down permanently upon it. He had 
no more breath to carry him on, and no 
more ambition. If Mary Amber had 
gone to thunder, why should he care 
whether he got an answer to his tele¬ 
gram or not? She was only another 
girl, anyway, GIRL, his enemy! And 
he sank into a blue stupor, with his 
elbows on his cold, cold knees and his 
face hidden in his hands. He had for¬ 
gotten the shivers now. They had 
taken possession of him, and made him 
one with them. It might be, after all, 
that he was too hot and not too cold; 
and there was a strange burning pain in 
his chest when he tried to breathe, so he 
wouldn’t breathe. What was the use? 


CHAPTER VI 


Miss Marilla tiptoed softly up the 
hall, and listened at the door of the 
spare bedroom. It was time her soldier- 
boy woke up and had some dinner. She 
had a beautiful little treat for him to¬ 
day, chicken broth with rice, and some 
little bits of tender breast-meat on toast, 
with a quivering spoonful of currant 

jelly. 

It was very still in the spare room, 

so still that a falling coal from the grate 

of the Franklin heater made a hollow 

sound when it fell into the pan below. 

If the boy was asleep, she could usually 

tell by his regular breathing; but, 

though she listened with a keen ear, she 

could not hear it to-day. Perhaps he 

was awake, sitting up. She pushed the 

door open, and looked in. Why! The 

in 


112 THE BIG BLUE SOLDIER 


bed was empty! She glanced around 
the room, and it was empty too! 

She passed her hand across her eyes 
as if they had deceived her, and went 
over to look at the bed. Surely he must 
be there somewhere! And then she saw 
the note. 

“Dear wonderful little mother!” 

Her eyes were too blurred with quick 
tears and apprehension to read any fur¬ 
ther. “Mother!” He had called her 
that. She could never feel quite alone 
in the world again. But where was he? 
She took the corner of her white apron, 
and wiped the tears away vigorously to 
finish the note. Then, without pausing 
to think, and even in the midst of her 
great gasp of apprehension, she turned 
swiftly, and went down-stairs, out the 
front door, across the frozen lawn, and 
through the hedge to Mary Amber’s 
house. 


THE BIG BLUE SOLDIER 113 


“Mary! Mary Amber!” she called as 
she panted up the steps, the note 
grasped tightly in her trembling hand. 
She hoped, oh, she hoped Mary Amber’s 
mother would not come to the door and 
ask questions. Mary’s mother was so 
sensible, and Miss Marilla always felt 
as if Mrs. Amber disapproved of her 
just a little whenever she was doing 
anything for anybody. Not that Mary 
Ambers’ mother was not kind herself 
to people, but she was always so very 
sensible in her kindness, and did things 
in the regular way, and wasn’t impul¬ 
sive like Miss Marilla. 

But Mary Amber herself came to the 
door, with pleasant forgetfulness of her 
old friend’s recent coolness, and tried to 
draw her into the hall. This Miss Ma¬ 
rilla firmly declined, however. She 
threw her apron over her head and 
shoulders as a concession to Mary’s 
fears for her health, and broke out: 


8 


114 THE BIG BLUE SOLDIER 


“Oh, don’t talk about me, Mary. 
Talk about him. He’s gone! I thought 
he was asleep; and I went up to see if 
he was ready for his dinner, and he’s 
gone! And he’s sick, Mary. He’s not 
able to stand up. Why, he’s had a fever. 
It was a hundred and three for two 
days, and only got down to below nor¬ 
mal this morning for the first time. He 
isn’t fit to be out, either, and that little 
thin uniform with no overcoat!” 

The tears were streaming down Miss 
Manila’s sweet Dresden-china face, 
and Mary Amber’s heart was touched in 
spite of her. 

She came and put her arm around 
Miss Manila’s shoulder, and drew her 
down the steps and over to her own 
home, closing the door carefully first 
so that her mother need not be troubled 
about it. Mary Amber always had tact 
when she wanted to use it. 


THE BIG BLUE SOLDIER 115 


“Where was he going, dear?” she 
asked sympathetically, with a view to 
making out a good case for the soldier 
without Miss Marilla’s bothering fur¬ 
ther about him. 

“I—do-don’t know!” sobbed Miss 
Marilla. “He just thought he ought 
not to stay and bother me. Here! See 
his note.” 

“Well, I’m glad he had some sense,” 
said Mary Amber with satisfaction. 
“He was perfectly right about not stay¬ 
ing to bother you.” She took the little 
crumpled note and smoothed it out. 

“O my dear, you don’t understand,” 
sobbed Miss Marilla. “He’s been such 
a good, dear boy, and so ashamed he 
had troubled me! And really, Mary, 
he’11 not be able to stand it. Why, you 
ought to see how little clothes he had! 
So thin, and cotton underwear! I 
washed them and mended them, but he 
ought to have had an overcoat.” 


116 THE BIG BLUE SOLDIER 


“Oh, well, he’ll go to the city and get 
something warm, and go to a hospital if 
he feels sick,” said Mary Amber com¬ 
fortably. “I wouldn’t worry about him. 
He’s a soldier. He’s stood lots worse 
things than a little cold. He’ll look out 
for himself.” 

“Don’t!” said Miss Marilla fiercely. 
“Don’t say that, Mary! You don’t un¬ 
derstand. He is sick , and he’s all the 
soldier-boy I’ve got; and I’ve got to go 
after him. He can’t be gone very far, 
and he really isn’t able to walk. He’s 
weak. I just can’t stand it to have 
him go this way.” 

Mary Amber looked at her with a 
curious light in her eyes. 

“And yet, Auntie Hill, you know it 
was fine of him to do it,” she said with a 
dancing dimple in the comer of her 
mouth. “Well, I see what you want; 
and, much as I hate to, I’ll take my car 


THE BIG BLUE SOLDIER 117 


and scour the country for him. What 
time did you say he left?” 

“O Mary Amber I” smiled Miss Ma¬ 
nila through her tears. “You’re a good 
girl. I knew you’d help me. I’m sure 
you can find him if you try. He can’t 
have been gone over an hour, not much; 
for I’ve only fixed the chicken and put 
my bread in the pans since I left him.” 

“I suppose he went back to the vil¬ 
lage, but there hasn’t been any train 
since ten, and you say he was still there 
at ten. He’s likely waiting at the sta¬ 
tion for the twelve o’clock. I’ll speed 
up and get there before it comes. I 
have fifteen minutes. I”—glancing at 
her wrist-watch—“I guess I can 
make it.” 

“I’m not so sure he went that way,” 
said Miss Marilla, looking up the road 
past Mary Amber’s house. “He was 
on his way up that way when—” and 
then Miss Marilla suddenly shut her 


118 THE BIG BLUE SOLDIER 

mouth, and did not finish the sentence. 
Mary Amber gave her another curious, 
discerning look, and nodded brightly. 

“You go in and get warm, Auntie 
Rill. Leave that soldier to me; I’ll 
bring him home.” Then she sped back 
through the hedge to the little garage, 
and in a few minutes was speeding 
down the road toward the station. Miss 
Marilla watched her in troubled silence, 
and then, putting on her cape that al¬ 
ways hung handy by the hall-door, 
walked a little distance up the road, 
straining her old eyes, but seeing noth¬ 
ing. Finally in despair she turned 
back; and presently, just as she reached 
her own steps again, she saw Mary’s car 
come flying back with only Mary in it. 
But Mary did not stop nor even look to¬ 
ward the house. She sped on up the 
road this time, and the purring of the 
engine was sweet music to Miss Ma- 


119 


THE BIG BLUE SOLDIER 

rilla’s ears. Dear Mary Amber, how 
she loved her! 

* * * 

The big blue soldier, cold to the soul 
of him, and full of pain that reminded 
him of the long horror of the war, was 
still sitting by the roadside with his head 
in his hands when Mary Amber’s car 
came flying down the road. She stop¬ 
ped before him with a little triumphant 
purr of the engine, so close to him that 
it roused him from his lethargy to 
look up. 

“I should think you’d be ashamed of 
yourself, running away from Miss Ma¬ 
nila like this, and making her worry 
herself sick!” Mary Amber’s voice was 
keen as icicles, and the words went 
through him like red-hot needles. He 
straightened up, and the light of battle 
came back to his eyes. This was GIRL 
again, his enemy. His firm upper lip 
moved sensitively, and came down 


120 THE BIG BLUE SOLDIER 


straight and strong against the lower 
one, showing the nice line of character 
that made his mouth beautiful. 

“Thank you,” he said coldly. “Fm 
only ashamed that I stayed so long.” 
His tone further added that he did not 
know what business of hers it was. 

“Well, she sent me for you; and you’ll 
please to get in quickly, for she’s very 
much worked up about you.” 

Mary Amber’s tone stated that she 
herself was not in the least worked up 
about a great, hulking soldier that 
would let a woman wait on him for sev¬ 
eral days hand and foot, and then run 
away when her back was turned. 

“Kindly tell her that I am sorry I 
troubled her, but that it is not possible 
for me to return at present,” he an¬ 
swered stiffly. “I came down to send 
a business telegram, and I am waiting 
for an answer.” 


THE BIG BLUE SOLDIER 121 


A sudden shiver seized him, and rip¬ 
pled involuntarily over his big frame. 
Mary Amber was eying him contempt¬ 
uously, but a light of pity stole into 
her eyes as she saw him shiver. 

“You are cold!” said Maiy Amber as 
if she were charging him with an 
offence. 

“Well, that’s not strange 1 —is it— 
on a day like this? I haven’t made 
connections yet with an overcoat and 
gloves; that’s all.” 

“Look here; if you are cold, you’ve 
simply got to get into this car and let 
me take you back to Miss Manila. 
You’ll catch your death of cold sitting 
there like that.” 

“Well, I may be cold; but I don’t 
have to let you take me anywhere. 
When I get ready to go, I’ll walk. As 
for catching my death of cold, that’s 
strictly my own affair. There’s nobody 
in the world would care if I did.” 


122 THE BIG BLUE SOLDIER 


The soldier had blue lights like steel 
in his eyes, and his mouth looked very 
soldier-like indeed. His whole manner 
showed that there wasn’t the least use 
in the world trying to argue with him. 

Mary Amber eyed him with increas¬ 
ing interest and thoughtfulness. 

“You’re mistaken,” she said grudg¬ 
ingly. “There’s one. There’s Miss 
Marilla. She’d break her heart. She’s 
like that ; and she hasn’t much to care 
for in the world, either. Which makes 
it all the w r orse what you’ve done. Oh, 
I don’t see how you could deceive her.” 

“Deceive her?” said the astonished 
soldier. “I never deceived her.” 

“Why, you let her think you were 
Dick Chadwick, her nephew; and you 
know you’re not! I knew you weren’t 
the minute I saw you, even before I 
found Dick’s telegram in the stove say¬ 
ing he couldn’t come. And then I 
asked you a lot of questions to find out 


THE BIG BLUE SOLDIER 123 

for sure, and you couldn’t answer one 
of them right.” Her eyes were spark¬ 
ling, and there was an eager look in her 
face, like an appeal, almost as if she 
wanted him to prove what she was say¬ 
ing was not true. 

“No, I’m not Dick Chadwick,” said 
the young man with fine dignity. “But 
I never deceived Miss Marilla.” 

“AVell, who did then?” There were 
disappointment and unbelief in Mary 
Amber’s voice. 

“Nobody. She isn’t deceived. It 
was she who tried to deceive you.” 

“What do you mean?” 

“I mean she wanted you to think I 
was her nephew. She was mortified, I 
guess, because he didn’t turn up, and 
she didn’t want you to know. So she 
asked me to dinner to fill in. I didn’t 
know anybody was there till just as I 
was going in the door. Then I had to 
go and get sick in the night, and dish 


124 THE BIG BLUE SOLDIER 


the whole thing. I was a fool to give 
in to her, of course, and stay that night, 
but it did sound good to have a real 
night’s sleep in a bed. I didn’t think 
I was such a softie as to get out of my 
head and be on her hands like that. But 
you needn’t worry. I intend to make 
it up to her fully just as soon as I can 
lay hands on some funds—” 

He suddenly broke into a fit of 
coughing so hoarse and croupy as to 
alarm even Mary Amber’s cool con¬ 
tempt. She reached back in the car, 
and, grasping a big fur coat, sprang out 
on the hard ground, and threw the coat 
about him, tucking it around his neck 
and trying to fasten a button under his 
chin against his violent protest. 

“You’re very kind,” he gasped 
loftily, as soon as he could recover his 
breath. “But I can’t put that on, and 
I’m going down to the telegraph-office 
now to see if my wire has come yet.” 


THE BIG BLUE SOLDIER 1 25 

“Look here,” said Mary Amber in 
quite a different tone, “I’m sorry I was 
so suspicious. I see I didn’t under¬ 
stand. I ask your pardon, and won’t 
you please put on this coat, and get 
into this car, and let me take you home 
quick? I’m really very much troubled 
about you.” 

The soldier looked up in surprise at 
the gentleness, and almost his heart 
melted. The snarly look around his 
mouth and eyes disappeared, and he 
seemed a bit confounded. 

“Thank you,” he said simply. “I ap¬ 
preciate that. But I can’t let you help 
me, you know.” 

“Oh, please!” she said, a kind of 
little-girl alarm springing into her eyes. 
“I sha’n’t know what to say to Miss 
Marilla. I proipised her to bring you 
back, you know.” 

His eyes and lips were hardening 
again. She saw he did not mean to 


126 THE BIG BLUE SOLDIER 


yield, and Mary Amber was not used to 
being balked in her purposes. She 
glanced down the road; and a sudden 
light came into her eyes, and brought 
a dimple of mischief into her cheek. 

‘‘You’ll have to for my sake,” she 
said hurriedly in a lower tone. “There’s 
a car coming with some people in it I 
know; and they w T ill think it awfully 
queer for me to be standing here on a 
lonely roadside talking to a strange sol¬ 
dier sitting on a log on a day like this. 
Hurry!” 

Lyman Gage glanced up, saw the car 
coming swiftly; saw, too, the dimple of 
mischief; but with an answering light of 
gallantly in his own eyes he sprang up 
and helped her into the car. The effort 
brought on another fit of coughing, but 
as soon as he could speak he said: 

“You can take me down to that little 
telegraph-office if you please, and drop 


THE BIG BLUE SOLDIER 127 

me there. Then nobody will think any¬ 
thing about it.” 

“I’ll take you to the telegraph-office 
if you’ll be good and put that coat on 
right, and button it,” said Mary Amber 
commandingly. She had him in the 
car now, and she knew that she could 
go so fast he could not get out. “But 
I shall not stop there until you promise 
me on your honor as a soldier that you 
will not get out or make any more 
trouble about my taking you back to 
Miss Manila,” 

The soldier looked very balky indeed, 
and his firm mouth got itself into fine 
shape again, till he looked into Mary 
Amber’s eyes and saw the saucy, beau¬ 
tiful lights there; and then he broke 
down laughing. 

“Well, you’ve caught me by guile,” 
he said; “and I guess we’re about even. 
I’ll go back and make my adieus my¬ 
self to Miss Marilla.” 


128 THE BIG BLUE SOLDIER 


A little curve of satisfaction settled 
about Mary Amber’s mouth. 

‘Tut that coat on, please,” she said, 
and the soldier put it on gratefully. He 
was beginning to feel a reaction from 
his battle with Mary Amber, and now 
that he was defeated the coat seemed 
most desirable. 

“Don’t you think it would be a good 
idea if you would tell me who you really 
are?” asked Mary Amber. “It might 
save some embarrassment.” 

“Why, certainly!” said the soldier in 
surprise. “It hadn’t occurred to me; 
that’s all. I’m Lyman Gage, of Chi¬ 
cago.” He named also his rank and 
regiment in the army. Then, looking 
at her curiously, he said, hesitating: 

“I’m—perfectly respectable, you 
know. I don’t really make a practice of 
going around sponging on unprotected 
ladies.” 


THE BIG BLUE SOLDIER 129 


Her cheeks flamed a gorgeous scar¬ 
let, and her eyes looked rebuked. 

“I suppose I ought to apologize,” she 
said. “But really, you know, it looked 
rather peculiar to me—” She stopped 
suddenly, for he was seized with another 
fit of coughing, which had so shrill a 
sound that she involuntarily turned to 
look at him with anxious eyes. 

“I s’pose it did look queer,” he man¬ 
aged to say at last; “but you know that 
day when I came in 1 didn’t care a 
hang.” He dropped his head wearily 
against the car, and closed his eyes for 
just a second, as if the keeping of them 
open was a great effort. 

“You’re all in now!” she said sharply. 
“And you’re shivering! You ought to 
be in bed this minute.” Her voice held 
deep concern. “Where is that tele¬ 
graph-office? We’ll just leave word 
for them to forward the message if it 
hasn’t come and then we’ll fly back. 


9 



130 THE BIG BLUE SOLDIER 


“Oh, I must wait for that message,” 
he said, straightening up with a hoarse 
effort and opening his eyes sharply. “It 
is really imperative.” 

She stopped the ear in front of the 
telegraph-office. The little operator, 
scenting a romance, scuttled out of the 
door with an envelope in her hand and 
a different look on her face from the one 
she had worn when she went to her 
lunch. To tell the truth, she had not 
had much faith in that soldier nor in the 
message he had sent “collect.” She 
hadn’t believed any answer would come, 
or at least any favorable one. 

Now she hurried across the pavement 
to the car, studying Mary Amber’s red 
tarn as she talked, and wondering 
whether she couldn’t make one like it 
out of the red lining of an old army cape 
she had. 

“Yer message’s come,” she an¬ 
nounced affably. “Come just after I 


THE BIG BLUE SOLDIER 131 


got back. An’ I got yer check all made 
out fer yah. You sign here. See? Got 
anybody to ’dentify yah? ’Tain’t nec¬ 
essary, see? I c’n waive identification.” 

“I can identify him,” spoke up Mary 
Amber with cool dignity; and the sol¬ 
dier looked at her wonderingly. That 
was a very different tone from the one 
she had used when she came after him. 
After all, what did Mary Amber know 
about him? 

He looked at the check half wonder¬ 
ingly as if it were not real. His head 
felt very queer. The words of the mes¬ 
sage seemed all jumbled. He crumpled 
it in his hand. 

“Ain’t yah going to send an answer?” 
put in the little operator aggrievedly, 
hugging the thin muslin sleeves of her 
little soiled shirt-waist to keep from 
shivering. “He says to wire him im¬ 
mediately. He says it’s important. I 


132 THE BIG BLUE SOLDIER 


guess you didn’t take notice to the 
message.” 

The soldier tried to smooth out the 
crumpled paper with his numb fingers; 
and Mary Amber, seeing that he was 
feeling very miserable, took it from 
him, and capably put it before him. 

“ Am sending you a thousand. Wire me your 
post-office address immediately. Good news. Im¬ 
portant. 

“(Signed) 

“Arthur J. Watkins.” 

“I guess I can’t answer that now,” 
said the soldier, trying his best to keep 
his teeth from chattering. “I don’t 
just know—” 

“Here, I’ll write it for you,” said 
Mary with sudden understanding. 
“You better have it sent in Aunt Rill’s 
care; and then you can have it for¬ 
warded anywhere, you know. I’ll write 
it for you;” and she took a silver pencil 
from the pocket of her coat, and wrote 
the telegram rapidly on a corner she 


THE BIG BLUE SOLDIER 133 


tore from the first message, handing it 
out for his inspection and then passing 
it on to the operator, who gathered it 
in capably. 

“Send this c’lect too, I s’pose,” she 
called after the car as it departed. 

“Yes, all right, anything,” answered 
Lyman Gage, wearily sinking back in 
the seat. “It doesn’t matter, anyway.” 

“You are sick!” said Mary Amber 
anxiously; “and we are going to get 
right home. Miss Marilla will be wild.” 

The soldier sat up holding his pre¬ 
cious check. 

“I’ll have to ask you to let me out,” 
he said, trying to be dignified under the 
heavy stupor of weariness that was 
creeping over him. “I’ve got to get to 
a bank.” 

“Oh, must you, to-day? Couldn’t we 
wait till to-morrow or till you feel bet¬ 
ter?” asked Mary anxiously. 


134 THE BIG BLUE SOLDIER 


“No, I must go now,” he insisted 
doggedly. 

“Well, there’s a bank on the next 
comer,” she said; “and it must be about 
closing-time.” She shoved her sleeve 
back, and glanced at her watch. “Just 
five minutes of three. We’ll stop, but 
you’ll promise to hurry, won’t you? I 
want to get you home. I’m worried 
about you.” 

Lyman Gage cast her another of 
those wondering looks like a child un¬ 
used to kindness suddenly being petted. 
It made her feel as if she wanted to cry. 
All the mother in her came to her eyes. 
She drew up in front of the bank, and 
got out after him. 

“I’ll go in with you,” she said. “They 
know me over here, and it may save 
you trouble.” 

“You’re very kind,” he said almost 
curtly. “I dislike to make you so much 
trouble-” 


Perhaps it was owing to Mary’s 



THE BIG BLUE SOLDIER 135 


presence that the transaction went 
through without question, and in a few 
minutes more they were back in the car 
again, Mary tucking up her big patient 
fussily. 

“You’re going to put this around 

* 

your neck,” she said, drawing a bright 
woolly scarf from her capacious coat- 
pocket, “and around your head,” she 
added, drawing a fold comfortingly up 
around his ears and the back of his 
head. “And keep it over your nose 
and mouth. Breathe through it; don’t 
let this cold air get into your lungs,” 
she finished with a businesslike air as 
if she were a nurse. 

She drew the ends of the scarf 
around, completely hiding everything 
but his eyes, and tucked the ends into 
the neck of the fur coat. Then she pro¬ 
duced another lap-robe from some re¬ 
gion beneath her feet, and tucked that 
carefully around him. It was wonder¬ 
ful being taken care of in this way; if 


136 THE BIG BLUE SOLDIER 


he only had not been so cold, so tired, 
and so sore all over he could have en¬ 
joyed it. The scarf had a delicate 
aroma of spring and violets, something 
that reminded him of pleasant things in 
the past; but it all seemed like a dream. 

They were skimming along over the 
road up which he had come at so labo¬ 
rious a pace, and the icy wind cut his 
eyeballs. He closed his eyes, and a hot 
curtain seemed to shut him out from a 
weary world. Almost he seemed to be 
spinning away into space. He tried to 
open his mouth under the woollen fra¬ 
grance and speak; but his companion 
ordered him sharply to be still till he 
got where it was warm, and a sharp 
cough like a knife caught him. So he 
sank back again into the perfumed 
silence of the fierce heat and cold that 
seemed to be raging through his body, 
and continued the struggle to keep from 
drifting into space. It did not seem 
quite gallant or gentlemanly to say 


THE BIG BLUE SOLDIER 137 


nothing, nor soldierly to drift away like 
that when she was being so kind. And 
then a curious memory of the other girl 
drifted around in the frost of his breath 
mockingly, as if she were laughing at 
his situation, almost as if she had put 
him there and was glad. He tried to 
shake this off by opening his eyes and 
concentrating them on Mary Amber as 
she sat sternly at her wheel, driving her 
little machine for all it was worth, her 
eyes anxious, and the flush on her cheek 
bright and glowing. The fancy came 
to him that she was in league with him 
against the other girl. He knew it was 
foolish, and he tried to drive the idea 
away; but it stayed till she passed her 
own hedge and stopped the car at Miss 
Manila’s gate. 

Then it seemed to clear away, and 
common sense reigned for a few brief 
moments while he stumbled out of the 
car and staggered into Miss Manila’s 
parlor and into the warmth and cheer of 


138 THE BIG BLUE SOLDIER 

that good woman’s almost tearful, 
affectionate welcome. 

“I want you to take that,” he said, 
hoarsely pressing into her hand the roll 
of bills he had got at the bank; and then 
he slid down into a big chair, and every¬ 
thing whirled away again. 

Miss Marilla stood aghast, looking 
at the money and then at the sick sol¬ 
dier, till Mary Amber took command. 
He never remembered just what hap¬ 
pened, nor knew how he got up-stairs 
and into the great warm, kind bed 
again, with hot-broth being fed him, and 
hot-water bags in places needing them. 
He did not hear them call the doctor 
on the telephone, nor know just when 
Mary Amber slipped away down to her 
car again and rode away. 

But Mary Amber knew that this was 
the afternoon when The Purling Brook 
Chronicle went to press, and she had 
an item that must get in. Quite de- 


THE BIG BLUE SOLDIER 139 

murely she handed the envelope to the 
woman editor just as she was preparing 
to mail the last of her copy to the 
printer in the city. The item read: 
“Miss Marilla Chadwick, of Shirley 
Road, is entertaining over the week-end 
Sergeant Lyman Gage, of Chicago, but 
just returned from France. Sergeant 
Gage is a member of the same division 
and came over in the same ship with 
Miss Chadwick’s nephew, Lieutenant 
Richard Chadwick, of whom mention 
has been made in a former number, and 
has seen long and interesting service 
abroad.” 

Mary Amber was back at the house 
almost before she had been missed and 
just as the doctor arrived, ready to 
serve in any capacity whatever. 

“Do you think I ought to introduce 
him to the doctor?” asked Miss Marilla 
of Mary in an undertone at the head of 
the stairs, while the doctor was divest- 


140 THE BIG BLUE SOLDIER 


ing himself of his big fur overcoat. She 
had a drawn anxious look like one about 
to be found out in a crime. 

“He doesn’t look to me as if he were 
able to acknowledge the introduction,” 
said Mary with a glance in at the spare 
bed, where the young man lay sleeping 
heavily and breathing noisily. 

“But—ought I to tell him his name?” 

“That’s all right, Auntie Bill,” said 
Mary easily; “I told him his name was 
Gage when I phoned, and said he was 
in the same division with your nephew. 
It isn’t necessary for you to say any¬ 
thing about it.” 

Miss Marilla paused, and eyed Mary 
strangely with a frightened, appealing 
look, and then with growing relief. So 
Mary knew! She sighed, and turned 
back to the sick-room with a comforted 
expression growing round her mouth. 

But the comforted expression 
changed once more to anxiety, and self 


THE BIG BLUE SOLDIER 141 


was forgotten utterly when Miss Ma¬ 
nila began to watch the doctor’s face as 
the examination progressed. 

“What has this young man been do¬ 
ing?” he growled, rising from a position 
on his knees where he had been listen¬ 
ing to the soldier’s breathing with an 
ever-increasing frown. Miss Marilla 
looked at Mary quite frightened, and 
Mary stepped into the breach. 

“He had a heavy cold when he came 
here, and Miss Chadwick nursed him, 
and he was doing nicely; but he ran 
away this morning. He had some busi¬ 
ness to attend to, and slipped away be¬ 
fore anybody could stop him. He got 
very much chilled, I think.” 

“I should say he did!” ejaculated the 
doctor. “Young fool! I suppose he 
thought he could stand anything be¬ 
cause he went through the war. Well, 
he’ll get his now. He’s in for pneu¬ 
monia. I’m sorry, Miss Chadwick, but 


142 THE BIG BLUE SOLDIER 


I’m afraid you’ve got a bad case on your 
hands. Would you like to have me 
phone for an ambulance and get him to 
the hospital? I think it can be done at 
once with a minimum of risk.” 

“Oh, no, no!” said Miss Marilla, 
clasping one white hand and then the 
other nervously. “I couldn’t think of 
that—at least, not unless you think it’s 
necessary—not unless you think it’s a 
risk to stay here. You see he’s my— 
that is, he’s almost—like—my own 
nephew.” She lifted appealing eyes. 

“Oh, I beg your pardon!” he said 
with a look of relief. “In that case he’s 
to be congratulated. But, madam, you’ll 
have your hands full before you are 
through. He’s made a very bad start 
—a very bad start indeed. When these 
big, husky fellows get sick, they do it 
thoroughly, you know. Now, if you’ll 
just step over here, Miss Mary, I’ll ex¬ 
plain to you both about this medicine. 



THE BIG BLUE SOLDIER 143 


Give this every lialf-hour till I get 
back. I’ll run up here again in about 
two hours. I’ve got to drive over to 
the Plush Mills now, to an accident 
case; but I’ll be back as quick as I can. 
I want to watch this fellow pretty 
closely for the first few hours.” 

When the doctor was gone, Mary 
Amber and Miss Marilla stood one on 
each side of the bed, and looked at each 
other, making silent covenant together 
over the sick soldier. 

“Now,” said Mary Amber softly, 
“I’m going down into the kitchen to 
look after things. You just sit here 
and watch him. I’ll run over first to 
put the car away and tell mother I’ll 
stay with you to-night.” 

“O Maiy Amber, you mustn’t do 
that,” said Miss Marilla anxiously. “I 
never meant to get you into all this 
scrape. Your mother won’t like it at 
all. I’ll get along all right; and any- 


144 THE BIG BLUE SOLDIER 

way, if I find I can’t, I’ll get Molly 
Poke to come and help me.” 

“Mother will be perfectly satisfied to 
have me help you in any way I can,” 
said Mary Amber with a light in her 
eyes; “and as for Molly Poke, if I can’t 
look after you better than she can, I’ll 
go and hide my head. You can get 
Molly Poke when I fail, but not till 

9 

then. Now, Auntie Rill, go sit down 
in the rockingchair and rest. Didn’t I 
tell you I’d help get that turkey dinner? 
Well, the dinner isn’t over yet; that’s 
all; and I owe the guest an apology for 
misjudging him. He’s all right, and 
we’ve got to pull him through, Auntie 
Rill; so here goes.” 

Mary Amber gave Miss Marilla a 
loving squeeze, and sped down the 
stairs. Miss Marilla sat down to listen 
to the heavy breathing of the sick sol¬ 
dier, and watch the long, dark lashes on 
the sunken, tanned cheeks. 


CHAPTER VII 


For three weeks the two women 
nursed Lyman Gage, with now and then 
the help of Molly Poke in the kitchen. 
There were days when they came and 
went silently, looking at each other with 
stricken glances and at the sick man 
with pity; and Mary Amber went and 
looked at the letter lying on the bureau, 
and wondered whether she ought to tele¬ 
graph that man who had sent the soldier 
the money that day. Another letter ar¬ 
rived, and then a telegram, all from Chi¬ 
cago. Then Mary Amber and Miss Ma¬ 
nila talked it over, and decided to make 
some reply. 

By that time the doctor had said that 
Lyman Gage would pull through; and 
he had opened his eyes once or twice 
and smiled weakly upon them. Mary 
Amber went to the telegraph-office, and 

10 145 


146 THE BIG BLUE SOLDIER 


sent a message to the person in Chicago 
whose name was written at the left- 
hand comer of the envelopes, the same 
that had been signed to that first 
telegram. 

“Lyman Gage very ill at my home, pneumonia, 
not able to read letters or telegram. Slight im¬ 
provement to-day. 

“(Signed) 

“ Marilla Chadwick.” 

Within three hours an answer arrived. 

“ Much distressed at news of Gage’s illness. Can¬ 
not come on account of fractured bone, automobile 
accident. Please keep me informed, and let me know 
if there is anything I can do. 

“(Signed) 

“Arthur J. Watkins.” 

Mary wrote a neat little note that 
night before she went on duty in the 
sick-room, stating that the invalid had 
smiled twice that day and asked what 
day of the week it was. The doctor felt 
that he was on the high road to re¬ 
covery now, and there was nothing to 
do but be patient. They would show 


THE BIG BLUE SOLDIER 147 

him his mail as soon as the doctor was 
willing, which would probably be in a 
few days now. 

The day they gave Lyman Gage his 
mail to read the sun was shining on a 
new fall of snow, and the air was crisp 
and clear. There were geraniums blos¬ 
soming in the spare-room windows be¬ 
tween the sheer white curtains, and the 
Franklin heater was glowing away and 
filling the place with the warmth of 
summer. 

The patient had been fed what he 
called “a real breakfast,” milk toast and 
a soft-boiled egg, and the sun was 
streaming over the foot of the bed gayly 
as if to welcome him back to life. He 
seemed so much stronger that the doc¬ 
tor had given permission for him to be 
bolstered up with an extra pillow while 
he read his mail. 

He had not seemed anxious to read 
the mail, nor at all curious, even when 


148 THE BIG BLUE SOLDIER 


they told him it was postmarked Chi¬ 
cago. Miss Marilla carried it to him 
gayly as if she were bringing him a 
bouquet, but Mary eyed him with a 
curious misgiving. Perhaps, after all, 
there would not be good news. He 
seemed so very apathetic. She watched 
him furtively as she tidied the room, 
putting away the soap and towels, and 
pulling a dry leaf or two from the ge¬ 
raniums. He was so still, and it took 
him so long to make up his mind to tear 
open the envelopes after he had them 
in his thin white hand. It almost 
seemed as if he dreaded them like a 
blow, and was trying to summon cour¬ 
age to meet them. Once, as she looked 
at him, his eye met hers with a depreca¬ 
tory smile, and to cover her confusion 
she spoke impulsively. 

“You don’t seem deeply concerned 
about the news,” she said gayly. 

He smiled again almost sadly. 


THE BIG BLUE SOLDIER 149 


“Well, no!” he said thoughtfully. “I 
can’t say I am. There really isn’t any¬ 
thing much left in which to be inter¬ 
ested. You see about the worst things 
that could happen have happened, and 
there’s no chance for anything else.” 

“You can’t always tell,” said Mary 
Amber cheerfully, as she finished dust¬ 
ing the bureau and took herself down¬ 
stairs for his morning glass of milk 
and egg. 

Slowly Lyman Gage tore the en¬ 
velope of the topmost letter, and took 
out the written sheet. In truth he had 
little curiosity. It was likely an ac¬ 
count of how his lawyer friend had paid 
back the money to Mr. Harrower, or 
else the details of the loan on the old 
Chicago house. Houses and loans and 
such things seemed far from his world 
just now. He was impatient for Mary 
Amber to come back with that milk and 
egg. Not so much for the milk and egg 


150 THE BIG BLUE SOLDIER 


as for the comfort it gave, and the 
cheeriness of her presence. Presently 
Mass Manila would come up and tell 
over some little incident of Mary's 
childhood exactlv as if he were Dick. 

we 

the real nephew; and he liked it. Not 
that he liked Dick, the villain! He 
found himself hopelessly jealous of him 
sometimes. Yet he knew in a feeble 
far-awav sense that this was onlv a 

w ** 

foolish foible of an invalid, and he 
would get over it and laugh at himself 
when he got well. 

He smiled at the pleasantness of it 
all, this getting-well business, and then 
turned his indifferent attention to 
the letter. 

‘"Dear Gage,*' it read, “what in the 
world did you hide yourself away in 
that remote comer of the world for? 
I’ve scoured the country to get trace of 
you without a single result till your tele¬ 
gram came. There’s good news to tell 




THE BIG BLUE SOLDIER 151 

you. The unexpected has happened, 
and you are a rich man, old fellow. 
Don’t let it turn your head, for there’s 
plenty of business to occupy you as 
soon as you are able to return. 

“To make a long story short, the old 
tract of land in which you put all you 
had and a good deal more has come to 
the front in great shape at last. You 
will remember that the ore was found 
to be in such shape when they came to 
the mining of it that it would cost fabu¬ 
lous sums for the initial operations, and 
it fell through because your company 
couldn’t afford to get the proper ma¬ 
chinery. Well, the Government has 
taken over the whole tract, and is work¬ 
ing it. I am enclosing the details on 
another paper, and you will perceive, 
when you have looked it over, how very 
much you arq needed at home just now 
to decide numerous questions which have 
taxed my ingenuity to the limit to know 


152 THE BIG BLUE SOLDIER 


just what you would want done. There 
is a great deal of timber on those lands 
also, very valuable timber, it seems; and 
that is another source of wealth for you. 
Oh, this war has been a great thing for 
you, yoimg man; and you certainly 
ought to give extra thanks that you 
came out alive to enjoy it all. Prop¬ 
erly managed, your property ought to 
keep you on Easy Street for the rest of 
your life, and then some. 

“I took pains to let Mr. Harrower 
know how the wind blew when I paid 
him the money you had borrowed from 
him. He certainly was one surprised 
man; and of course I don’t speak offi¬ 
cially, but from what he said I should 
judge that this might make a big dif¬ 
ference with Miss Elinore. So you bet¬ 
ter hurry home, old man, and get busy. 
The sun is shining, and the war is over. 
“Yours fraternally as well as officially, 
“Arthur J. Watkins/' 


THE BIG BLUE SOLDIER 153 

Over the first part of the letter 
Lyman Gage dallied comfortably as 
he might have done with his grapefruit 
or the chicken on toast that they had 
promised him for lunch. He had lost 
his sense of world values for the time 
being, and just now a fortune was no 
more than a hot-water bag when one’s 
feet were cold. It merely gave him a 
sense that he needn’t be in a hurry get¬ 
ting well, that he could take things easy 
because he could pay for everything 
and give his friends a good time after 
he was on his feet again. In short, he 
was no longer a beggar on Miss Ma¬ 
nila’s bounty with only a thousand dol¬ 
lars between him and debt or even the 
poorhouse. 

But, when he came to that last para¬ 
graph, his face suddenly hardened, and 
into his eyes there came a glint of steel 
as of old, while his jaw set sternly, and 


154 THE BIG BLUE SOLDIER 

lines came around his mouth, hard, bit¬ 
ter lines. 

So it was that that had been the mat¬ 
ter with Elinore, was it? She had not 
grown tired of him so much, but had 
wanted more money than she thought 
he would be able to furnish for a long 
time? He stared off into the room not 
seeing its cozy details for the first time 
since he began to get well. He was 
looking at the vision of the past trying 
to conjure up a face whose loveliness 
had held for him no imperfections. He 
was looking at it squarely now as it 
rose dimly in vision against the gray of 
Miss Manila’s spare-room wall; and 
for the first time he saw the petted 
under lip with the selfish droop at its 
corners, the pout when she could not 
have her own way, the frown of the 
delicate brows, the petulant tapping of 
a dainty foot, the proud lifted shoulder, 
the haughty stare, the cold tones and 


THE BIG BLUE SOLDIER 155 

crushing contempt that were hers 
sometimes. These had seldom been for 
him; and, when he had seen them, he 
had called them beautiful, had gloried 
in them, fool that he was! Why had 
he been so blind, when there were girls 
in the world like—well—say like Mary 
Amber? 

Misjudging Elinore? Well, per¬ 
haps, but somehow he did not believe 
he was. Something had cleared his 
vision. He began to remember things 
in Elinore Harrower that he had never 
called by their true names before. It 
appeared more than likely that Elinore 
had deliberately left him for a richer 
man, and that it was entirely possible 
under the changed circumstances that 
she might leave the richer man for him 
if he could prove that he was the richer 
of the two. Bah! What a thing to 
get well to! Why did there have to be 
things like that in the world? Well, it 


156 THE BIG BLUE SOLDIER 


mattered very little to him what Elinore 
did. It might make a difference with 
her, but it would make no difference to 
him. There were things in that letter of 
hers that had cut too deep. He could 
never forget them, no, never, not even 
if she came crawling to his feet and beg¬ 
ging him to come back to her. As for 
going back to Chicago, business be 
hanged! He was going to stay right 
here and get well. A smile melted out 
on his lips, and comfort settled down 
about him as he heard Mary Amber’s 
step on the stairs and the soothing clink 
of the spoon in the glass of egg and milk. 

“Good news?” asked Mary Amber as 
she shoved up the little serving-table 
and prepared to administer the egg and 
milk. 

“Oh, so-so!” he answered with a 
smile, sweeping the letters away from 
him and looking at the foaming glass 
with eager eyes. 


THE BIG BLUE SOLDIER 157 

“Why! You haven’t opened them 
all!” laughed Mary Amber. 

“Oh! Haven’t I?” he said impa¬ 
tiently, sweeping them up and tearing 
them open wholesale with only a glance 
at each, then throwing them back on 
the coverlet again. 

“Nothing but the same old tiling. 
Hounding me back to Chicago,” he 
grinned. “I’m having much too good a 
time to get well too fast, you may 
be sure.” 

Somehow the room seemed cozier 
after that, and his sleep the sweeter 
when he took his nap. He ate his 
chicken on toast slowly to prolong the 
happy time; and he listened and smiled 
with deep relish at the little stories Miss 
Marilla told of Mary Amber’s child¬ 
hood, the gingerbread men with cur¬ 
rant eyes, and the naughty Dick who 
stole them. This world he was in now 
was such a happy, clean little world, 


158 THE BIG BLUE SOLDIER 


so simple and so good! Oh, if he could 
have known a world like this earlier in 
his life! If only he could have been the 
hapless Dick in reality! 

Molly Poke was established in the 
kitchen down-stairs now, and Miss Ma¬ 
nila hovered over her anxiously, leav¬ 
ing the entertaining of the invalid much 
to Mary Amber, who wrote neat busi¬ 
ness letters for him, telling his lawyer 
friend to do just as he pleased with 
everything till he got back; and who 
read stories and bits of poems, and 
played chess with him as soon as the 
doctor allowed. Oh, they were having 
a happy time, the three of them! Miss 
Marilla hovered over the two as if they 
had been her very own children. 

And then one lovely winter after¬ 
noon, when they were just discussing 
how perhaps they might take the in¬ 
valid out for a ride in the car some day 


THE BIG BLUE SOLDIER 159 

next week, the fly dropped into the 
ointment! 

It was as lovely a fly as ever walked 
on tiny French heels, and came in a 
limousine lined with gray duvetyn and 
electrically heated and graced with 
hothouse rosebuds in a slender glass be¬ 
hind the chauffeur’s right ear. She 
picked her way daintily up the snowy 
walk, surveyed the house and grounds 
critically as far as the Amber hedge, 
and rang the bell peremptorily. 

Miss Marilla herself went to the 
front door, for Molly Poke was busy 
making cream-puffs and couldn’t stop; 
and, when she saw the little fly standing 
haughtily on the porch, swathed in a 
gorgeous moleskin cloak with a volu¬ 
minous collar of tailless ermine, and a 
little toque made of coral velvet em¬ 
broidered in silver, she thought right 
away of a spider. A very beautiful 


160 THE BIG BLUE SOLDIER 


spider, it is true, but all the same a 
spider. 

And, when the beautiful red lips 
opened and spoke, she thought so all 
the more. 

“I have come to see Lyman Gage,” 
she announced freezingly, looking at 
Miss Marilla with the glance one gives 
to a servant. Miss Marilla cast a 
frightened glance of discernment over 
the beautiful little face. For it was 
beautiful, there was no mistaking that, 
very perfectly beautiful, though it 
might have been only superficially so. 
Miss Marilla was not used to seeing a 
skin that looked like soft rose-leaves 
in baby perfection on a person of that 
age. Great baby eyes of blue, set wide, 
with curling dark lashes, eyebrows that 
seemed drawn by a fairy brush, lips 
of such ruby-red pout, and nose chisel¬ 
led in warm marble. Peaches and cream 
floated through her startled mind, and 


THE BIG BLUE SOLDIER 161 

it never occurred to her it was not 
natural. Oh, the vision was beautiful; 
there was no doubt about that. 

Miss Marilla closed the door, and 
stood with her back to the stairs and a 
look of defence upon her face. She had 
a fleeting thought of Mary and whether 
she ought to be protected. She had a 
spasm of fierce jealousy, and a frenzy 
as to what she should do. 

“You can step into the parlor,” she 
said in a tone that she hoped was calm, 
although she knew it was not cordial. 
“I’ll go up and see if he’s able to see 
you. He’s been very sick. The doctor 
hasn’t let him see any”—she paused, 
and eyed the girl defiantly—“any 
strangers ." 

“Oh, that’ll be all right,” laughed 
the girl with a disagreeable tinkle. “I’m 
not a stranger. I’m only his fiancee.” 
But she pronounced “fiancee” in a way 
that Miss Marilla didn’t recognize at 


11 


162 THE BIG BLUE SOLDIER 


all, and she looked at her hard. It 
wasn’t “wife,” anyway; and it hadn’t 
sounded like “sister” or “cousin.” Miss 
Marilla looked at the snip—that was 
what she began to call her in her mind 
—and decided that she didn’t want her 
to see Lyman Gage at all; but of course 
Lyman Gage must be the one to decide 
that. 

“What did you say your name was?” 
she asked bluntly. 

For answer the girl brought out a 
ridiculous little silk bag with a clatter¬ 
ing clasp and chain, and took therefrom 
a tiny gold card-case, from which she 
handed Miss Marilla a card. Miss Ma¬ 
rilla adjusted her spectacles, and 
studied it a moment with one foot on 
the lower stairs. 

“Well,” she said reluctantly, “he 
hasn’t seen any one yet; but I’ll go and 
find out if you can see him. You can 
sit in the parlor.” She waved her hand 


THE BIG BLUE SOLDIER 163 

again toward the open door, and started 
up-stairs. 

The blood was beating excitedly 
through her ears, and her heart pounded 
in pitiful thuds. If this “snip” be¬ 
longed to her soldier boy, she was sure 
she could never mother him again. She 
wouldn’t feel at home. And her 
thoughts were so excited that she did 
not know that the fur-clad snip was fol¬ 
lowing her close behind until she was 
actually within the spare bedroom, and 
holding out the card to her boy with a 
trembling little withered-rose-leaf hand. 

The boy looked up with his wide, 
pleasant smile like a benediction, and 
reached out for the card interestedly. 
He caught the look of panic on Miss 
Manila’s face and the inscrutable one 
on Mary Amber’s. Mary had heard the 
strange voice below and arisen from 
her reading aloud to glance out of the 
window. She now beat a precipitate re- 


164 THE BIG BLUE SOLDIER 


treat into the little sewing-room just 
off the spare bedroom. Then Lyman 
Gage realized another presence in the 
room, and looked beyond to the door 
where stood Elinore Harrower, her big 
eyes watching him jealously from her 
swathing of gorgeous furs, while he 
slowly took in the situation. 

It had been a common saying among 
his friends that no situation however un¬ 
expected ever found Lyman Gage off 
his guard, or ever saw him give away 
his own emotions. Like lightning there 
flitted over his face now a sudden cloud 
like a curtain, shutting out all that he 
had been the moment before, putting 
under lock and seal any like or dislike 
he might be feeling, allowing only the 
most cool courtesy to appear in his ex¬ 
pression. Miss Marilla, watching him 
like a cat, could not tell whether he was 
glad or sorry, surprised or indignant or 
pleased. He seemed none of these. He 


THE BIG BLUE SOLDIER 165 

glanced with cool indifference toward 
the lovely vision smiling in the door¬ 
way now and ready to gush over him, 
and a stern dignity grew in the set of 
his jaw r s; but otherwise he did not seem 
to have changed, and most casually, as 
if he had seen her but the week before, 
he remarked: 

“Oh! Is that you, Elinore? Seems to 
me you have chosen a cold day to go 
out. Won’t you sit down?” He mo¬ 
tioned toward a stiff little chair that 
stood against the wall, though Mary 
Amber’s rocker was still waving back 
and forth from her hasty retreat. 

Miss Marilla simply faded out of the 
room, although Gage said politely, 
“don’t leave us, please.” But she was 
gone before the words were out of his 
mouth, and with a sudden feeling of 
weakness he glanced around the room 
wildly, and realized that Mary Amber 
was gone too. 


166 THE BIG BLUE SOLDIER 


Mary Amber stood in the sewing- 
room, and wondered what she ought to 
do. For the other door of the sewing 
room was closed and barred by a heavy 
iron bed that had been put up for con¬ 
venience during the soldier’s illness, and 
the only spot that was long enough to 
hold it was straight across the hall door. 
Obviously Mary Amber could not get 
out of the sewing-room without moving 
that bed, and she knew by experience 
of making it every morning that it 
squeaked most unmercifully when it 
was moved. Neither could she go out 
through the spare bedroom, for she felt 
that her appearance would cause no end 
of explanations; and equally of course 
she dared not shut the door because it 
would make a noise and call attention to 
her presence. 

So Mary Amber tiptoed softly to the 
farthest end of the little room, and stood 
rigidly silent, trying not to listen, yet 


THE BIG BLUE SOLDIER 167 

all the more attuned and sensitive to 
whatever was going on in the next room. 
She fairly held her breath lest they 
should hear her, and pressed her fingers 
upon her hot eyeballs as if that would 
shut out the sound. 

“That’s scarcely the way I expected 
you to meet me, Lyme,” in the sweet 
lilt of Elinore Harrower’s petted voice. 

“I was scarcely expecting you, you 
know, after what has happened,” came 
chillingly in Lyman Gage’s voice, a bit 
high and hollow from his illness, and all 
the cooler for that. 

“I couldn’t stay away when I knew 
you were ill, Lyme, dear!” The voice 
was honeyed sweet now. 

“What had that to do with it?” The 
tone was almost vicious. “You wrote 
that we had grown apart, and it was 
true. You are engaged to another 
man.” 

“Well, can’t I change my mind?” The 


168 THE BIG BLUE SOLDIER 


tone was playful, kittenish. It smote 
Lyman Gage’s memory that he had 
been wont to call it teasing and enjoy 
it in her once upon a time. 

“You’ve changed your mind once too 
often!” The sick man’s voice was tense 
in his weakness, and his brow was dark. 

“Why, Lyme Gage! I think you are 
horrid!” cried the girl with a hint of in¬ 
dignant tears in her voice. “Here I 
come a long journey to see you when 
you’re sick; and you meet me that way, 
and taunt me. It’s not like you. You 
don’t seem a bit glad to see me! Per¬ 
haps there’s some one else.” The voice 
had a taunt in it now, and an assurance 
that expected to win out in the end, no 
matter to what she might have to de¬ 
scend to gain her point. 

But she had reckoned without knowl¬ 
edge, for Lyman Gage remembered the 
picture he had torn to bits in the dying 
light of the sunset and trampled in 


THE BIG BLUE SOLDIER 169 


the road; those same brilliant eyes, that 
soft tinted cheek, those painted lips, had 
smiled impudently up to him that way 
as he had ground them beneath his heel; 
and this was GIRL, his natural enemy, 
who would play with him at her pleas¬ 
ure, and toss him away when he was no 
longer profitable to her, expecting to 
find him ready at a word again when 
circumstances changed. He straight¬ 
ened up with sudden strength, and 
caught her words with a kind of joy¬ 
ful triumph. 

“Yes, there is some one else! Mary! 
Mary Amber!” 

Mary Amber, trying not to hear, had 
caught her name, heard the sound in his 
voice like to the little chick that calls 
its mother when the hawk appears; and 
suddenly her fear vanished. She 
turned, and walked with steady step 
and bright eyes straight into the spare 
bedroom, a smile upon her lips and a 


170 THE BIG BLUE SOLDIER 


rose upon her cheek that needed no cos¬ 
metics to enhance its beauty. 

“Did you call me—Lyman?” she 
said, looking straight at him with rescue 
in her eyes. 

He put out his hand to her, and she 
went and stood by the bed over across 
from the visitor, who had turned and 
was staring amazedly, insolently at her 
now. 

Lyman Gage put out his big, wasted 
hand, and gathered Mary Amber’s 
hand in his, and she let him! 

“Mary,” said Lyman Gage posses¬ 
sively, and there were both boldness and 
appeal in his eyes as he looked at her, 
“I want Miss Harrower to know you; 
Miss Amber, Miss Harrower.” 

Elinore Harrower had risen with one 
hand on the back of her chair; and her 
crimson lips parted, a startled expres¬ 
sion in her eyes. Her rich furs had 
fallen back, and revealed a rich and 


THE BIG BLUE SOLDIER 171 

vampish little frock beneath; but she 
was not thinking of her frock just then. 
She was looking from one to the other 
of the two before her. 

“I don’t understand!” she said 
haughtily. “Did you know her before?” 

Lyman Gage flashed a look at Mary 
for indulgence, and answered happily. 

“Our friendship dates back to when 
we were children and I spent a summer 
with my Aunt Marilla teasing Mary, 
and letting the sawdust out of her 
dolls.” He gave a daring glance at 
Mary, and found the twinkles in her 
eyes playing with the dimples at the cor¬ 
ner of her mouth; and his fingers clung 
more warmly around hers. 

The two were so absorbedly in¬ 
terested in this little comedy they were 
enacting that they had quite failed to 
notice its effect upon the audience. 
Elinore Harrower had gathered her fur 
robes about her, and was fastening 


172 THE BIG BLUE SOLDIER 


them proudly at her throat. Her dark 
eyes were two points of steel, and the 
little white teeth that bit into the pout¬ 
ing crimson under lip looked vicious 
and suggestive. 

“I did not understand,” said Elinore 
haughtily. “I thought you were among 
strangers, and needed some one. I will 
leave you to your friends. You always 
did like simple country ways, I re¬ 
member;” and she cast a withering 
glance around. 

“Why, where is Aunt Rilla, Mary?” 
asked Lyman, innocently ignoring the 
sneer of his guest. “Aunt Marilla!” 
he raised his voice, looking toward the 
door. “Aunt Marilla, won’t you please 
come here?” 

Miss Marilla, her heart a perfect 
tumult of joy to hear him call her that 
way, straightened up from her ambush 
outside the door, and entered precipi¬ 
tately, just as the haughty guest was 


THE BIG BLUE SOLDIER 173 

about to stalk from the room, if one so 
small and exquisite as Elinore can be 
said to stalk. The result was a collision 
that quite spoiled the effect of the exit, 
and the two ladies looked at each 
other for a brief instant much as 
two cats might have done under similar 
circumstances. 

Mary Amber s eyes were dancing, 
and Lyman Gage wanted to laugh, but 
he controlled his voice. 

“Aunt Manila, this is Miss Har- 
rower, a girl who used to be an old friend 
of mine, and she thinks she can’t stay 
any longer. Would you mind taking 
her down to the door? Good-by, 
Elinore. Congratulations! And I 
hope you’ll be very happy!” He held out 
his free hand—the other still held Mary 
Amber’s, and the smile upon his lips 
was full of merriment. But Elinore 
Harrower ignored the hand and the 
congratulations; and, drawing her fur 



174 THE BIG BLUE SOLDIER 

mantle once more about her small 
haughty shoulders, she sailed from the 
room, her coral and silver toque held 
high, and her little red mouth drooping 
with scorn and defeat. Miss Marilla, 
all hospitality now that she understood, 
offered tea and cake, but was vouch¬ 
safed no answer whatever; and so in 
joyous, wondering silence she attended 
her soldier’s guest to the door. 

Lyman Gage lay back on his pillows, 
his face turned away from Mary Amber, 
listening; but his hand still held Mary 
Amber’s. And Mary Amber, standing 
quietly by his side, listening too, 
seemed to understand that the curtain 
had not fallen yet, not quite, upon the 
little play; for a smile wove in and out 
among the dimples near her lips, and her 
eyes were dancing little happy lights of 
mirth. It was not until the front door 
shut upon the guest and they heard the 
motor’s soft purr as the car left the 


THE BIG BLUE SOLDIER 175 

house that they felt the tenseness of the 
moment relax, and consciousness of 
their position stole upon them. 

“Mary, Mary Amber!” whispered 
Lyman Gage softly, looking up into her 
face, “can you ever forgive me for all 
this?” 

He held her hand, and his eyes 
pleaded for him. 

“But it is all true. There is another 
one. I love you! And oh, I’m so tired. 
Mary Amber, can you forgive me—and 
—and love me, just a little bit?” 

Down upon her knees went Mary 
Amber beside that bed, and gathered 
her soldier boy within her strong young 
arms, drawing his tired head upon her 
firm, sweet shoulder. 

When Miss Marilla trotted back up¬ 
stairs on her weary, glad feet, and put 
her head in at the door fearfully, to see 
how her boy had stood the strain of the 
visitor—and to berate herself for hav- 



176 THE BIG BLUE SOLDIER 

ing allowed a stranger to come up with¬ 
out warning, she found them so, with 
Mary Amber soothing her patient to 
sleep by kisses on his tired eyelids, and 
the soldier’s big white hand enfolding 
Mary’s little one contentedly, while the 
man’s low voice growled tenderly: 

“Mary, you are the only girl I ever 
really loved. I didn’t know there was a 
girl like you when I knew her.” 

So Miss Marilla drew the door to 
softly lest Molly Poke should come 
snooping round that way, and trotted 
off to the kitchen to see about some char¬ 
lotte russe for supper, a great thankful 
gladness growing in her heart, for—oh! 
suppose it had been that other—hussy! 

The End 


















































































































